


At the Inn at the End of the World

by Like_a_Hurricane



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Sandman (Comics)
Genre: Constantine might also make a brief appearance but only if you squint, It's raining AUs, M/M, at a tavern and inn located at a nexus hovering perpetually over the ending of all worlds, probably the closest thing to a coffeeshop AU I am capable of, since Loki is technically a bartender and tavern wench in this fic, sort of like the Neil Gaiman version of the Restaurant at the End of the Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-10
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-16 13:01:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 24,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9272897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Like_a_Hurricane/pseuds/Like_a_Hurricane
Summary: Admiral Anthony Stark, head of an extensive pirate fleet in his home universe, gets hit by a hailstone from a Reality Storm and it knocks his teleportation askew, so he lands at the World's End Inn. He meets the god of lies there… and then several versions of himself, and of the god in question, and the patterns which arise with each new meeting––particularly patterns relating to his relationship with Loki in these myriad universes––begins to affect them both.Set in the World's End Inn, from Neil Gaiman'sSandmanseries, which in turn was inspired by the G.K. Chesterton poem "A Child of the Snows" from the lines of which I nicked the title for this fic.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [seizure7](https://archiveofourown.org/users/seizure7/gifts).



> Those who have read more of my fic may notice a few old universes (Dangerous Animals, Dare to Believe in Us) glimpsed narrowly through this fic, as well as newer ones (Don't Hate the Player; Hate the Pantheon, featuring Cern) wandering into the story in the midst of the reality storm.

An exasperated, refined and oddly accented voice heaved a sigh and said, “Charlene, fetch more scotch from the cellar, please; we’ve got another Tony Stark who has arrived.”

“What the fuck do you mean ‘another’? I am one of a damned kind,” Tony slurred, barely half-conscious. He managed to force his eyes to focus and realized he was lying flat on his back in the middle of a half-empty tavern, drooling slightly, with his wrist bleating uncertain readings about his location and his teleportation system sparking slightly. The tavern felt ancient, but then, to Tony, any building made mostly out of wood felt that way. Upon second glance, though, the roof looked like actual thatch, which Tony had only ever seen in movies, and all the light was from oil-burning glass lamps on tables, and a few ceiling fixtures it was difficult to make out from his current floor position. The floor smelled like hay and dusty old books.

The voice, deep and resonant and male, spoke again: “I said something similar upon my first visit here, as well.”

Someone very tall loomed over him. Tall with long black hair and clothing that seemed to be mostly leather, but in a classy-yet-viking-themed sort of way. The leather clung to legs that went on for days, before the asymmetrical hem of the tall man’s coat obscured them after about mid-thigh and above, which was so disappointing to Tony that he skipped ahead from there, to looking the man right in the eye and––wow those were some intensely green eyes.

Tony felt momentary regret that he hadn’t sounded a bit more clever, rather than petulant, with the first words he’d uttered in front of the pretty man with cheekbones that could’ve been carved by artisan-crafted glaciers. “And who the fuck are you?” he added, because he had already ruined this first impression, probably, so why not make it worse? It was, and probably always would be, the Stark way.

“Well, that’s interesting. You’re the first version of you who hasn’t recognized me, and started off with either insults or lewd innuendo.”

Somehow, it was reassuring to think of alternate versions of himself making even worse first impressions. Then his brain stopped short. “Versions of me?”

“Multiple universes have sent their lost to this place, in its very long life. Rest assured, in your native one, you’re still as unique as ever; it’s just that your universe itself isn’t. Welcome to the World’s End Inn, Mr. Stark-”

“Admiral.”

Loki raised an eyebrow. “Admiral?”

“Are other versions of me not leaders in the worlds of intergalactic piracy?”

A long, considering moment passed. “Most of them seemed to still live on Midgard––or Earth, as they insist on correcting me. I haven’t met any other smuggler versions of you.”

“Piracy,” Tony corrected him. “I’ve got a full armada now, and we are actually quite diversified in our enterprises, and we do a lot more than just smuggling, thank you very much. Also I haven’t been back to Earth in… twenty-one years? Anyway, it’s not like I was born there. And I still dunno who you are, by the way.”

“I am Loki.”

A few things clicked in Tony’s mind. “World’s End. This is an Inn?”

Loki nodded.

“I’ve heard of this place. And you. Natasha and Clint got stranded here during a freak Reality Storm that interfered with one of their attempts to return to my fleet.”

“Most people find their way to this place by such means, when worlds are under strain and thin places between different universes shred open long enough for travelers to be diverted to this place.”

“I also heard you’re sort of a refugee, here. And you were a god of lies?”

“Ah, that Natasha. Yes, that was only the second time I’ve met any versions of her. I thought it strange that neither she nor her archer friend recognized me either. The latter surprised me; three other versions of Clint Barton have attempted to greet me by putting arrows through my eye,” the god mused, smirking a little. “Is there no Asgard in your universe?”

“Well… I don’t know, but I’ve certainly never been there, if it exists.”

“No thunder-gods named Thor known to the cultures of Earth?”

“Er… doesn’t sound familiar. But, well––religion really isn’t my area of study. Polytheism hasn’t been super relevant to my life.”

“Perhaps I shall add your universe to the list of places it might actually be safe for myself and my kin to set foot in, then, perhaps.”

“You got many of those? I could use a new one or two myself.” He tried to sit up, then jerked and twitched for a moment before falling limp on the floor again, his whole body tingling unpleasantly.

Loki’s expression remained a polite mask with a thin smile, except how that smile twisted wryly. “It seems your traveling device has sustained damages. Do you need help removing it, or should I leave you to shock yourself repeatedly while attempting to do it on your own?”

“Help would be appreciated,” Tony admitted. His words might have been trailed by smoke. He felt fried enough for it. How it hadn’t stopped his heart, he wasn’t certain. He was aware of the pretty face above him moving closer as Loki crouched down next to him, examining the wreckage which only now gave off a couple of visible angry sparks of warning near its lower edge, halfway down the admiral’s abdomen.

“Is it possible to disconnect this power cell?” the trickster tapped one long-fingered hand against the arc reactor, rather than the conductive metal frame.

“It’s embedded in my chest underneath that cover, so that’s easier said than done, actually,” the pirate admitted. He then startled slightly at the sensation of the whole vest teleporting about two feet to the left of him, with a flash of green magic. The reactor in his chest was not removed, nor apparently tampered with. Its connection to the vest had not been unscrewed. Just… moved right through him like it slipped into another plane for a few seconds and then phased back into normal existence. “How the fuck did you do that?”

Loki shot him a curious look. “Are you unfamiliar with magic?”

“I’ve learned a bit about it, but never found many magic types willing to put up with both questioning and scientific scrutiny of the actual physics involved.”

“Physics?”

“Sort of a language made up mostly of numbers, which we Earthlings use to try to explain how the universe works. Magic is anathema to most of it, but I don’t think they’re fully incompatible.” _Not anymore_ , he didn’t add. He was still trying to work out just how the god had discerned the detachable parts from non-detachable so quickly, and removed them without apparent effort. Seeing tall, dark and handsome proffer a hand, he picked up his now-non-electrified tech in one hand and accepted the aid in returning to the world of the upright with the other. At least, his spine was upright. His morals, never.

Loki tilted his head, for the first time showing a spark of genuine interest out from behind his masks. “Intriguing, for a mortal.”

“You saying the version of me from your universe is less impressive?”

“You didn’t exist there. Nor did Natasha and Clint, or their Avengers, though I told them stories other versions of me have told, about other versions of them.” His mask then fixed back on. “I have met more versions of you, here, than them, of course.”

Tony got the sinking suspicion that his own independent first-impression might not be the problem, so much as those of his prior selves. It felt like having his reputation proceed him, but worse, because he didn’t even get to have the fun of earning the reputations of those prior versions of himself. He opened his mouth to, doubtlessly, make it worse, but was interrupted by Loki being elbowed aside by a small woman with wildly curly red hair and more human-looking green eyes, who proffered a bottle of scotch and said, “You don’t get more than that until I’m convinced you actually know how to leave this time.”

He felt rather personally attacked. “Pardon?”

“I instigated a rule, after the third time a Stark crashed here, of any gender or title, and didn’t reveal until the third night of carousing that they had no way of getting to their home universe. This bottle is a gesture of good faith, and once you’ve repaired your transport, or give up your pride and ask directions, you’re welcome to harass the staff here further. Until then, you’re quarantined to this table and under my watch, is that understood, Mr. Stark?”

“Admiral,” Tony corrected, but he sounded a bit sheepish this time, and his body language had much of its confidence deflated.

She rolled her eyes. “Look, I’ll even be nice and tell you who to get your directions from.” Charlene turned to Loki and batted her eyelashes up at him.

He smiled indulgently at her in response. “I did not agree to this.”

“I still have seniority over you, here. He didn’t try to kiss you or kill you so far, even, which is better than the previous four Starks since you started working here. Just don’t destroy him, and get him out safe, like a good employee, if need be, okay?”

Tony’s eye twitched. He hadn’t thought Nat was serious when she said the god of lies was _employed_ by the tavern, but here it clearly was. It was also strangely reassuring, the thought that anyone could escape here, just for the price of working to upkeep the inn and tavern.

“If requested, _Admiral_ ,” Loki said, making the title sound dryly irreverent, “I can help guide you home.”

Charlene nodded approval. “Good. Now, get back behind the bar, it’s your shift.”

The trickster rolled his eyes, but turned and strode away in the direction of aforesaid bar.

“How many tried to kiss him, exactly?” Tony asked, once the god of lies was on the other side of the room and, he hoped, out of hearing range.

“Oh, just two. And only one has tried to kill him right off the bat, so far, though another clearly wanted to so I count him too.” She shrugged. “What’s your inclination towards the one from your universe, then, just so I know?”

“I don’t have one. I mean, I don’t even know what an Asgard is.”

Charlene appeared surprised, then thoughtful. “Huh. Interesting.”

“Why is that interesting?”

“I’ve met about seventeen of you so far, over the years, because none of you can stop yourselves from mucking about with the fabric of time and space recklessly. I’ve worked here a long time. I’m human, technically, but since I joined the staff here, I haven’t aged a day,” she explained succinctly. “Only two of them before you have had nothing to say about Loki, including not claiming they didn't have one in their universes.” Before he could ask anything else of her, she nodded at the wrecked technology in his hand and shrugged a knapsack off her shoulder. “This is a tool-kit one of you left behind here. It should help you with your repair work.”

Once he took the bag from her, she strode away and up a nearby staircase.

Tony scowled after her, but strode a bit further into the tavern-section of the Inn’s ground floor, moving away from what looked like a converted ballroom full of long tables and benches for feasting at with dozens of your closest comrades, towards what appeared to be the front of the inn, based on its large entry doors with windows to the outside through which the pirate could see a path stretching away into thick forest. The tables here were smaller, but still had benches around them rather than individual chairs––even the round tables, of which there were several, which could easily seat up to eight people around them, at each corner of the room. The benches were heavy and solid as the tables, using very simple, thick cuts of timber that the space pirate considered medieval-looking. Tony settled at an isolated round table with a good view of every exit in the room––and, incidentally, of the bartender too––and began tinkering with his poor, scorched tech, trying to figure out what could have possibly done the damage.

When he figured it out, he set the tech aside with an aggravated sigh, and opened the bottle of scotch. As if by magic, Charlene then reappeared with a glass and a bowl of ice and set them beside the bottle.

Tony twitched, having been unaware of her re-entering the room to keep an eye on him as promised. He wondered how long he had been working on his project, and finally took note of the time on his still-functioning wristband, which contained a touch-interface and would normally connect back to JARVIS’s main systems, but not here. He also had missed messages, despite having no network connectivity in the tavern, and he frowned at that.

“You alright?” Charlene asked.

“There’s about to be a reality storm, so you’ll be bustling in here soon, right?”

Brow furrowed, she shot him an uncertain look. “Storms are indeed when most people get blown in.”

“I got hit by a chunk of debris from it––sort of like a hail-stone––while attempting to teleport further than my drained reactor could fully support.” He tossed a couple of ice chunks into the glass and poured scotch over them. “Some of my safeguards fell, during the jump, as a result, and let the hail-stone through. I’m not sure how that landed me here, yet, or how to get back, but you might want to warn the rest of the staff to prepare for a rush.”

She sighed heavily, but offered him a slightly thankful smile. “Thank you. I’ll let them all know.”

Twenty minutes later, by Tony’s watch, a loud rumble that sounded less like thunder and more like a landslide hitting a junkyard, sounding off the arrival of the reality storm, proved him right. For a moment he enjoyed the predictability.

Then, scarcely twelve feet away to his right, he saw Steve Rogers push the large front door open for one of his Iron Man suits and choked on his scotch. When he realized that this Iron Man was carrying a blue and bloodied Loki, decked out in armor, but also in chains connected to manacles at his ankles and wrists, he looked suspiciously at the scotch bottle itself.

“No, I didn’t poison you,” Charlene shouted in his direction as she headed for the door. She notably had another bottle of scotch sticking out of the side-pocket of her apron as she went.

Behind Iron Man was a tall man with long blond hair, some of it braided back, wearing space-age viking armor and carrying what appeared to be a fancy metal cartoon mallet, T’Challa and Dr. Strange.

The admiral felt even more uncomfortable when Iron Man’s face-mask lifted and he realized it was being piloted by a slightly different, but still highly recognizable, Tony Stark.

“Welcome to my life, Admiral,” the paler Loki said, beside him.

The pirate did a double-take. “Why are you suddenly ginger? I mean, the freckles are gorgeous, don’t get me wrong, but-”

“I have discovered that it makes Avengers less wary of me, if I in some clearly-recognizable way fail to resemble the version of me they know better. Humans are predictable, that way.” He was also carrying a tray with one tall cup and two smaller ones, all of which seemed to be steaming slightly.

“Not always. Your shift at the bar over?”

“Yes, it will be taken over by our landlady.” He gestured towards a dark-haired woman in a colorful sari making her way towards the bar. “Since my arrival, she enjoys letting me handle any issues caused by alternate versions of myself. Apparently, in the past, she has found many of me to be a hassle.”

“Yeah… same for me, I’m guessing, with Charlene?”

“From what I’ve heard.”

“Who is the hammer guy?”

Loki looked at him very shrewdly, for any sign of deceit, then beamed upon finding none. “No one important. Just another version of my adopted brother.”

 

~~

 

“Dammit, Strange, I tried to warn you, but would you fucking listen?” snarled the incredibly blue new Loki on the doorstep of the World’s End Inn.

“He did warn you,” Iron Man responded.

“Lift up the mask, will you? That electronic voice is always too loud, indoors,” Steve requested, still scowling and dripping wet from the rain exposure.

“I am sorry, friends, this storm was beyond my command,” Thor rumbled.

“Reality storms are very different from lightning-storms, we understand,” T’Challa assured him, patting one of the thunder god’s biceps. “Is your brother well?”

“Not in the least, and you can address me directly, you know. I’m certainly no threat to you, for the time being, sapped of magic as I now am because of you ungrateful lot. You have no idea how damned lucky you are that I couldn’t shake you off and preserve myself,” Loki snarled.

“Bullshit,” Tony told him flatly, his mask now up.

“Stark, don’t begin to overestimate your value to me.”

“I don’t think I am. Nor is your inch-deep hand-print on the side of my suit. You could’ve let us go, and you didn’t, and now you’re in pain and lashing out and sulky as fuck because you’re afraid Thor will notice you didn’t want him to die,” Tony responded.

Loki began swearing and trying to struggle out of the grip of the metal arms cradling his body, but then discovered the extent of his own injuries as he did so. The pain knocked his breath out of him.

“Yep, I pissed him off so much he lost words. I told you it was possible, Strange, and you doubted me. You should really stop doubting other experts, you know. It makes you look like an asshole.”

“Yes, this has been a very regrettably educational day,” Strange intoned gravely.

At that point, the tavern staff approached them: and a man who looked almost exactly like Loki in his paler color scheme (except for his pale ginger hair and greener eyes) and a disarmingly human normal-looking woman with wilder auburn curls bearing a bottle of scotch.

The man was holding a tray with steaming beverages. He set it on the nearest table and lifted the taller cup to offer himself, while Charlene set aside the scotch bottle on the tray in order to pick up the two smaller cups and offer them to T’Challa and Dr. Strange. She explained to them, “These are healing tonics, on the house. You both got thrown around a lot in that storm.”

The Loki-like man proffered the taller glass to his bluer doppelgänger. “And a stronger one for you.”

“Who are you? Where is this?” Loki asked.

“Welcome to the World’s End Inn. I’m not from your universe. This is a nexus between worlds, and you’ve been washed in by the reality storm,” said Loki the ginger. “I am a different version of you, which will doubtlessly get confusing, so call me Loptr for sheer convenience.” He shot Thor a sidelong look. “And you keep out of arm’s length of me, please, or I cannot promise not to stab you on accident.”

“Accident?” Tony prompted, playfully chiding.

The familiarity of the address caused Loptr to shoot him an unimpressed look. “You’re not the first Stark I’ve met. You’re doing well compared to your peers by not harassing me so far. Don’t push it.”

With a rueful, but slightly pleased expression, Loki took the healing potion offered and slowly drained it.

Loptr didn’t miss the slight disappointment on Tony’s face when Loki then requested to be put down. Nonetheless, the inventor obeyed, and even offered an arm to help steady the god once his feet were back under him.

Slowly, Loki’s eyes faded from red to pale blue again with traces of pale green around the edges of his pupils, and the blue coloration and raised markings both faded from his skin as he warmed back up, and his blood-flow normalized. He shook his head sharply a couple of times as he handed the cup back to Loptr. “The added sedative was both unnecessary and annoying.”

“I try to tell her that every time she mixes these tonics, but she seemed to think every injured lost soul must be desirous of rest,” Loptr sighed.

“Why are you here, if this is an in-between place?” T’Challa asked.

“I live here. In return, I work in the tavern and help to upkeep the inn and its magics,” the ginger trickster responded. “The same goes for most of us, save for what few visitors we’ve had tonight, before you, but I daresay you won’t be the last. If you could move out of the main path from the front door, that would be ideal.”

The Avengers all murmured sheepishly at the realization they were all still blocking the door, and they settled on a table to their collective left.

 

~~

 

Admiral Stark wasn’t entirely comfortable with alternate versions of his Avengers moving closer to him. They hadn’t appeared to notice him, and there was a small empty table between himself and them, but he was also unable to stop staring at them all, so it would surely be just a matter of time before one of them looked his way.

Luckily, they all seemed to be distracted by _Loptr_. The admiral wondered where that name came from, as he watched the man now using it frown at a version of his own brother from another universal mother.

Well, most of them. Loki was focusing on the manacles at his wrists, experimentally tapping at the metal with a bit of ice off of a blue-darkened left thumb for a moment before he smirked and became pale again, breaking off the piece of ice and letting it fall to the floor.

Also distracted was Iron Man, but that was just stepping out of his armor, which folded itself up out of the way under the table once he was free of it.

 

~~

 

Once Loptr finished taking all of their drink orders and wandered away, the Avengers returned their attention to their own trickster, who stared back at them without amusement.

“You could free me, you know, I’ve clearly already failed to maintain the façade of villainy,” Loki told them.

“You don’t get forgiven by us for that,” Steve replied. “You need us for something.”

“Well, maybe,” Loki mused.

“Why were you in New York?” Strange insisted.

“I enjoy walking the city, actually. It’s very head-clearing, and pleasantly fast-paced in its liveliness, unlike Asgard.”

“Loki,” Thor growled, warningly.

“Look, I’ve only tried to kill you directly and in all seriousness once, and I have saved your life thrice since then. You have the very least to complain about, Thor.”

Tony failed to restrain a small chuckle, at that. When the others looked at him he shrugged, “What? It’s not untrue.”

“You harmed thousands on Midgard, and millions in Jotunnheim,” Thor rumbled. “I distrust you, still, Loki, because I do not have evidence that you would hesitate to do such things again, if it suited your purposes, or what you perceived to be necessity.”

“Oh, I have been disillusioned with the notion of necessity since my fall into the void, have no concerns there. It was part of what I clung to, in order to retain some self of self-worth in that abyss––the notion that my being expendable and unnecessary to Asgard was only their judgement, and an illusory one at best.” He smiled unkindly.

“Why rule Asgard, then?” T’Challa asked. “Why bother with people who value you so little?”

“To prove that I am capable of being a better king than Odin, of course. Proving myself smarter and more powerful than Thor having failed, I sought to make my point another way, and I mostly succeeded.”

“Until we caught you,” Strange said flatly.

“I _did_ help you find Odin.”

They all glared flatly at him.

“I didn’t madden him. He was already… madder than I could have made him.”

“You also didn’t mention that to all of us,” Tony pointed out.

Loki didn’t even glance at him, his jaw clenching. “Perhaps there was reason for that.”

The inventor’s expression turned momentarily rueful.

Charlene, who had stepped out to see if anyone else was visibly arriving outside the still-open front door while Loki settled the Avengers in, returned then, with the bottle of scotch.

“We have a general rule about Starks, but it does include a peace offering,” she greeted him with.

The whole table startled as if electrified, and stared at her.

“I uh––don’t drink anymore, actually, but thanks,” Tony said.

Loki did a double-take at that, staring at him hard before abruptly looking away.

Charlene smiled at him a bit more sincerely, then. “Oh good, one of the sober ones. You’ll get along fine. If you can’t figure out how to get home after the storm, ask Loptr, but it’s his first night entrusted with Guide-duty, so try not to make it too difficult for him, okay?”

“Ones?” Tony asked hesitantly.

“Multiple universes wash up lost people here, during reality storms, and they aren’t all different versions of this asshole.” She pointed at Loki. “I’ve met versions of all of you before, but it’s nice to see you again.” She winked particularly at T’Challa, who seemed a little embarrassed. “However, that’s also why we have a rule about Starks. Separate rules for you, Loki,” she added, “but you usually know how to get home without help, so it’s mostly a matter of damage control.”

Loki beamed up at her beatifically.

She snorted. “Don’t poison anyone, is all I ask.”

The trickster appeared put-out.

“I’m Charlene, by the way. If you need anything else, just ask for me, or catch Loptr’s attention.”

Promptly, Loki leaned over and took the scotch bottle from her.

She let him, without batting an eye, though she noticed Tony frown slightly.

“Any other questions?” Charlene asked. There was a susurration of general agreement that no, they couldn’t think of anything, and so she cheerfully left them alone.

After a long pause, Thor rumbled, “What possible reason, Loki?”

“Well, in your case, brother dear, it was how you never questioned his sentencing of me. I should have been executed, but he allowed Frigga to talk him out of it. Then he punished her for it by decreeing that she would never be allowed to see me again, and you didn’t wonder if perhaps he was losing his grasp on sanity?” Loki scoffed. “Even his treatment of Dr. Foster and the matter of the Aether should have been a clue, but instead of recognizing his frailty and accepting the responsibility of the throne, you once again left it to others.”

“I still do not suspect your presence in New York was simply returning to the scene of your past crime, particularly given what we now know of your experiences under Thanos’ command,” Strange cut in. “If I were you, I would want to avoid the scars in the sky over Stark tower like the plague, but we found multiple occasions, over a series of two years, wherein you appeared on security footage at various cafes and bookstores around Stark tower.”

The tables around them had begun to fill up with strangers from all throughout the multiverse, and somehow the susurration of so many other conversations, many of them even louder and more dramatic at the other end of the room, seemed to increase their sensation of privacy, their voices not traveling as far now, as the room filled up.

“Indeed, when Dr. Strange told me of this, Loki, I began to suspect you must have something of value hidden in the area,” Thor added.

Loki cracked open the bottle of scotch, as Loptr reappeared with a series of flagons and an extra, empty glass as well as a bowl of ice, though the ginger trickster frowned slightly as he set them down beside the bottle. Loki shot him a questioning look, slightly annoyed by such visible skepticism.

“I never liked scotch, is all,” Loptr responded.

Thor’s brow furrowed thoughtfully, at that, and Tony seemed to be staring very hard at the table for a second.

“Oh,” Loptr mused, as he handed out flagons. “Is _that_ what this is about?”

“Excuse me?” Loki snapped.

“You _miss_ him, you idiot. He’s right there, and he looks like the look on your face right now is gutting him, so clearly whatever he did he’s at least sorry for,” Loptr pointed out, gesturing towards Tony. “Get over yourselves. I’ve seen two universes in which you two were married, at this point, so the multiverse is on your side.”

Loki choked on his sip of scotch at the same time Tony almost dropped the slightly-steaming flagon of hot chocolate he had just been handed into his lap, managing to get the cup to land on the table with a clatter that miraculously only spilled a few scalding drops onto the table.

Steve’s face was red, Thor looked startled and slightly enraged, but T’Challa just sighed deeply, distracting both blonds with the depth of exasperation in it. They watched, flabbergasted, as he handed a fifty-dollar bill over to Dr. Strange, who smirked a bit as he pocketed it.

“I do recommend that any violent reactions any of you might be feeling not be expressed within the walls of this place. They don’t take kindly to it, and are more powerful and older than I,” Loptr warned. “Good evening to you.” He then left.

A very long silence passed.

“I am sorry,” Tony said quietly. “I was drunk, and I said a lot that I didn’t mean, and that you didn’t deserve.”

Loki inhaled sharply, not looking at him.

“Tony, how could you-” Steve started.

“Don’t, Steve. It’s a long story, and I don’t know if you’ve earned it from me, given all you’ve kept from me and expected me to still trust you later in spite of. Leave it for now, this isn’t about the Avengers,” the inventor snapped.

“If I have ever known two people more prone to speaking too quickly, practicing the arts of selective omission and practical deception, and ceaseless seeking of intellectual pursuits, I cannot think of them,” Thor mused. “I suppose I should not be surprised. He is like a shorter Angrboða, in many ways.”

“I’m not sure how to take that, since I’ve met her,” Tony mused, “and she didn’t seem to much like me.”

“You defended me to her,” Loki reminded him, still not looking at him.

At that, Thor was stunned into silence, but it didn’t last longer than seven seconds during which his mouth hung open. “When was this?!”

“Last year,” Tony said. “For my part, I was already in love by that point.”

“Tony-” the trickster rasped.

“What, this is part of it, isn’t it? I didn’t believe you when you told me how crazy Odin had gotten in the past century, because talking about senility right after Aunt Peggy died was beyond my capabilities. I lashed out, and I hurt you, and then you made sure I was in a position to warn the rest of the Avengers about it, and they didn’t believe me either. You put me exactly in your position.”

Loki’s expression finally cracked. “I’m sorry.”

Dr. Strange reached over, then, and tapped one of Loki’s manacles. It fell free, followed shortly after by all of the others.

“Strange, what is the meaning of this?” Thor demanded.

“Oh, please. The metal and spells were damaged by the temperature changes it went through over the past few hours, as well as the energies of the reality storm. He was leaving them on to humor us. I’m simply dropping the pretense, before I explore the rest of the tavern.”

“What?” Steve sputtered.

“We have just fought Odin. I am not looking forward to doing so again once this storm is over, and we will all need to be rested and prepared for it, mentally and physically, as much as possible. This is an inn, and I am desperately in need of sleep, if I’m going to be any use to you all later, and you two in particular-” he nodded to Loki and Tony, “-clearly have personal issues to sort out that are nothing to do with me, so I’m off to find out who I need to talk to in order to get room to sleep in.”

“I feel a need to pursue a similar quest,” T’Challa said slowly. “Steve, you should come with us.” When the super-soldier protested, eventually both other men had to drag him away, insisting that they could get back to moral and practical points once back in their own universe.

Loki silently reminded himself to do something nice for them before they could claim that he owed them a favor. He was exhausted at the thought alone, but debts needed to be avoided.

“Anthony,” Thor rumbled, “Tread carefully.”

“Fuck off, will you? You make this difficult enough,” Tony snapped in return. “I’m not your close friend, Thor. I’m barely your comrade-in-arms and you’re chronically dismissive of the capabilities of my tech. Is it any wonder I decided to listen to what your brother had to say, after a while? Please leave, and I’ll discuss this with you later.”

Thor startled. “But, Anthony-”

“Please go, Thor, I’m not done pouring my heart out, and I really don’t want your oversight for all of it. Loki isn’t always your business.”

It shouldn’t have shocked him, really, that those would be the words to make Loki not only look at him, but seize hold of the front of his shirt and pulled him closer so they faced each other.

Thor, to his credit, did actually leave, vanishing into the crowd almost sheepishly.

“I love you,” Loki rasped. “Please never send me away again.”

“I won’t,” Tony assured him, sighing with bone-deep relief when that finally earned him a kiss. He clung to the god of lies tightly. “I missed you,” he whispered, when it broke, just for a moment, before his lips again sought more contact.

 

~~

 

Admiral Stark was not sure what to make of this. Well, he was certain that the way the pair of them were kissing was going to haunt his dreams, but the rest of it?

He looked at his glass of scotch, sighed, and drained it despite his sudden reservations about it. _How many of me really are better off sober?_ That thought was going to haunt him too.

He also suddenly regretted his universe lacking an Asgard, but wasn’t sure he should. He was doing fine on his own, right? Things had fallen through with Pepper, and sure, he hadn’t been with anyone beyond the occasional flings since then, but he was doing fine, didn’t need anyone.

He had also just watched someone wearing his face spend half a conversation trying to stomp his own heart down into the dust, and then the rest of it pouring it everywhere. Even before Loptr’s interruption, the admiral had felt sympathetic twinges of regret and self-loathing just watching that face, hearing his own voice straining with the effort of keeping too many things unsaid.

It was deeply disconcerting.

He caught Loptr’s sleeve on his way by, as he made his rounds through the room. “Married?”

“Well, I partially lied to them. I’ve met one of you wearing a wedding-band made by my hands, and another who was dealing with the anxiety caused by me accidentally proposing to him while under the influence of Kree narcotics. How sincere the proposal actually was, I’m still not certain, but they remained romantically involved.”

“But the other two?”

“Included the time one of you tried to kill me, and another who only wished he could,” Loptr explained. “Fate is as nothing. It’s pure chance.”

Somehow, Tony doubted that. It wasn’t that the trickster’s voice lacked conviction, but there was something dismissive about it. Wanting to be able to dismiss it too, however, the admiral just nodded in response.

“Any luck with your device?” Loptr asked.

“Well, yeah, about that. This place… all the readings I am getting about this place are complete nonsense. I could really use some help.” He struggled past the remains of his irrational pride. “Please?”

The trickster smiled, and sat down beside him. “I will not be able to implement anything until the storm is over, you understand.”

“But does your role as a guide mean that, maybe, you could explain what you’re going to do? Or how it works?” Tony wheedled gently.

“Well,” Loptr mused, “Guide-related duties do allow me to forsake tavern-related ones. I suppose I might be able to teach you a few things about magic.” Green sparks flickered from his fingers and began to lay out illustrative models and formulae out across the tabletop, glittering and convoluted.

The admiral’s heartbeat quickened as his eyes poured over sigils and numbers in combinations he didn’t yet understand, but now desperately wanted to, and his smile took on a hungry cast. “Wow, that’s awesome. What am I seeing?”

And the god of lies began to explain.

 

~~

 

The storm raged on for another two hours. Eventually, Loptr was called back to other duties by an irate landlady, and eventually Tony packed up his repair work into the remaining space in the sack of tools Charlene had given him, and started to wander through the crowd, his head still abuzz with strange formulae and maps for new forms of energy interaction related to what the god of mischief called magic.

The admiral wasn’t certain if he should call it magic himself. It seemed to be tied up with something specific to users of magic, he was willing to admit, but how they did it still made only so much sense to him before it just… didn’t.

He wasn’t expecting to see a third Loki this evening. He could tell it was a third one because his armor was different––more understated––and he wore what looked like a traveling cloak. Detecting at once that he was being watched, this Loki immediately looked up and met Tony’s stare with green eyes darker than Loptr’s, this time. The expression that overtook his face was momentarily hunted, then suspicious, then dismissive.

“I’m not from your universe,” said the god, droll and annoyed.

“Yeah, I know. Mine doesn’t have one of you, to the perpetual surprise of many, in here tonight,” Tony shot back. “Even you, by the looks of it.”

He nodded. “I concede, I am surprised.”

“You come here often?”

“You’re right in guessing I have been here before. I have also been to the other three inns like it.”

“Woah, there are others?”

“Oh yes. Not all the travelers caught in reality-storms wash into the same corners of this nexus between universes. Two of others are run by Loptr’s children, another child works as one of the more menial staff at the third, as his father does here. He _is_ going by Loptr, tonight, isn’t he? I’m just sticking with Lyesmith, myself, to be safe. It does get terribly confusing for people, if too many of us wind up here at once.”

“Yes, it’s Loptr for him, I think, and I can imagine that confusion well, at this point. Has the same ever happened with multiple versions of me here at once, that you’ve seen?”

“No, it’s rather unusual that three of you are here tonight.”

Tony blinked rapidly. “Three? I just saw the one who went upstairs with a blue version of you for aggressive make-up sex.”

Lyesmith looked perturbed by that. “I didn’t catch sight of that incident. It must’ve been before I arrived. To each their own, I suppose.”

“Yeah, they were some of the first to arrive after the rumbling started.”

“You were here before the storm?”

“Yeah, but it was still the storm’s fault. I got hit with a sort of hail-barrage from it, while trying to teleport.”

“You teleport?”

“Of course I do. It’s how I pull off a number of thefts.”

“You’re quite different from many of the versions of you here, tonight, Stark.”

“Admiral Stark.”

An arrow suddenly flew across the room towards Lyesmith’s face. He caught it and a flash of magic defused the explosive tip this time. “Hello Barton,” he greeted grimly. “Excuse me, I should go.” He vanished in a cloud of green smoke.

Tony turned at the familiar calls of the grumpy-bitching Hawkeye, and saw a slightly blonder version of Clint Barton than he remembered from his own universe, doing a lot of angry swearing, as he stumbled to a halt and reluctantly put his next arrow back in his quiver.

“Did he fucking get a mental whammy on you or something, Stark, what gives?”

“I am not from your universe,” Tony deadpanned. “I am a space pirate. For all you know, I might’ve been hitting on him. Be careful whose groove you interrupt around here, too, by the way. There’s another version of me upstairs having angry make-up sex with a different version him, and apparently, there’s more than one universe where we’re married.”

Clint gaped at him openly.

Tony pulled the half-empty scotch bottle out of the bulging bag over his shoulder and proffered it to the archer, who accepted it, took a large swig, and gave it back, then asked, “What the actual fuck, Tony?”

“Trust me, it’s been a fucking head-trip for me too. Especially since another Loki works here, apparently because he’s a refugee from his own universe or something. You can tell him apart easy, and he’s from a universe that you don’t exist in so go easy on him if you see a ginger version of Loki going around serving drinks.”

“Okay, duly noted. We’re in the fucking twilight zone, and other universe versions of us are around?” the archer asked hesitantly.

“Basically, dude,” Tony agreed, taking a swig of scotch himself, larger than Clint’s, before screwing the lid back on and returning it to his bag. “The ginger one is going by Loptr to avoid confusion, and that other one has been here before and said he was using one of his other epithets, but in my universe we don’t have an Asgard, so I’m at a loss how many more there might be here, tonight, and what they do when they run out of nicknames.”

“You know, I wouldn’t be surprised if you two were fucking in my universe, too,” Clint admitted. “The pair of you never stop sniping at each other in fights, but with you the line between sniping and flirting is sometimes very narrow.”

“Why do you guys fight him, exactly?”

“He tried to take over the earth with an alien army, and put me and other S.H.I.E.L.D. agents under mind control to turn us against our own friends in order to steal the artifacts he needed in order to do it,” the archer summarized neatly.

At first, Tony had almost laughed, until the mention of mind control and his friend’s hollowly emotionless tone fully sunk in, and all mirth left him. “That… doesn’t sound like the smartest plan.”

“It wasn’t. We stopped him. You still have me in _your_ universe, right?”

Tony nodded, with a wry smile. “Yes. You, and the rest of the Avengers are vital to my fleet, and to me.”

Clint appeared slightly shocked by the open admission, but grinned. “Cool. Oh, uh, also if you see a version of you who is slightly high on a strange space-spore, and refuses to take off his roller skates, it means he’s escaped Bruce’s care. It’s harmless, but he’s just high as balls, so be gentle with him, and don’t mention sex with Loki. I don’t need confirmation that it’s happening if it is happening, and if it’s not, I don’t need him getting any ideas, especially in this state.”

Laughing helplessly at the plight of his alternate self, the admiral nodded. “Okay, yeah, but that just gives me further incentive to keep wandering the crowd. That sounds sort of hilarious.”

“Yeah, Bruce tried to take him to a quiet corner in the library upstairs, once Natasha discovered it. Hopefully there’s a quiet corner left in this place,” Clint complained. “But thanks for the warning about the ginger––er––Loptr guy. And others. I’ll tell the others to be on the lookout for doppelgängers and not to kill any of them too hastily.”

As though on cue, they heard a familiar voice calling, “Anton! Anton, is that you? You’re the only one not dressed like you’re from earth-”

Tony turned and saw another Loki, feeling Clint tense beside him, but not draw another arrow. The admiral was distracted, however, by seeing his own tech apparently embedded in this Loki’s chest.

“Where did you get that?” Tony asked dangerously.

Loki’s lips thinned. “Damn. Not you either, then. How many of you are there, here tonight, anyway?”

“Jury’s out,” said the admiral.

“Did you find my brother, Loki?” a Thor-voice called from about ten feet away––now a considerable distance, in such a densely packed crowd.

“Not your brother!” a voice on the other side of the room shouted.

Loki’s brow furrowed. “Was that _my_ voice over there?”

“Wait,” Clint hedged. “You’re not Thor’s brother?”

“What?” Loki sputtered. “No! I’m human, same as you, Clint.”

The archer pawed at Tony’s arm: a small, pleading gesture. “Can you please hand me that bottle of scotch again?”

“So you…” Loki pointed at the admiral. “You think this is yours?” he tapped at his arc reactor. “Not in _my_ universe, darling.”

“You don’t exist, in mine,” Tony responded.

That gave Loki pause, his eyes narrowing. “How…”

“No Asgard,” the archer said. “And he’s the inventor with the thing in his chest.”

“I keep the glowing covered up, to keep any savvy assassins from aiming right for it and doing something disastrous,” said the admiral.

“I suppose that’s reasonable,” Loki responded. “Why are you dressed like a space pirate?”

“Because I _am_ a space pirate,” Tony assured him.

“Farbautisson!” a non-Thor voice called out, alarmed and worried, from somewhere in the crowd to their left.

“Over here!” Loki called back.

“Fairbawdy?” Clint attempted.

“Far-bau-tis-son,” Loki enunciated slowly for him. “It was anglicized to Forbisson by immigration officials when my grandfather came to America, but I changed it back to the pre-Ellis-Island version mostly to piss off my father.”

Tony grinned a bit at that, and opened his mouth to respond, when suddenly the owner of the voice who had called Loki a moment ago burst into view and clung to Loki’s side, arms about his waist, burying his face against the front of the mortal’s shoulder. He was another Anthony Stark, but seemed to be wearing Asgardian style clothes in dark red leather-and-cloth with gold armor accents.

“There you are, Anton,” Loki sighed, relieved, resting a hand on Anton’s right arm where it now rested across his stomach. “You really shouldn’t let Thor set you off so easily. It’s far too multiversal in here for you to wander off. You might start trying to collect more of me.”

Tony handed Clint the bottle of scotch again, and the archer gratefully took a hearty swig from it.

Anton glanced up at the movement. “Is this about the mind control thing? I did apologize repeatedly.”

Clint choked, coughed. “I’m sorry, what?”

“Did I not try to invade Midgard in your universe?” Anton asked.

“No! You didn’t!” the archer shouted. “He did!” He pointed at Loki.

“But he’s _from_ Midgard, that just doesn’t make sense, Barton,” Anton sighed.

“Darling, in his universe, I’m the god of mischief, and apparently Thor’s brother.”

“Adopted,” Clint said.

“Wait, adopted-adopted, or son of Odin’s late younger brother who got adopted as a son officially, but nobody told me I’m half-Jotun?” Anton inquired.

“Fully adopted,” Loptr said, joining them suddenly, with a few flagons of mead and beer on a tray. “Laufey was my father, and that seems to be a common thread with most other versions of me in the room other than you, Mr. Farbautisson.”

Anton stared a bit. “You were right, I should totally collect more of you while we’re here. How many have you all spotted so far?”

“No,” Loki responded flatly.

“There seems to be a ludicrous number of us here tonight,” Loptr said. “Better here than any of the other three taverns in this nexus, I suppose.”

“Why is that?” Tony asked.

“Because one of my children works at each of them, and they do so complain about the embarrassment of dealing with too many of me at once,” Loptr responded.

“Three?” Anton asked. “Don’t tell me any are twins, I’ve read that myth and I didn’t like it one bit.”

“No. They are merely Hel, Fenrir, and Jörmungandr.”

“The… the giant snake?” Clint asked tentatively. “Also, which of those on the tray is strongest and can I have it?”

“Jörmungandr can take the form of a serpent at will, and often prefers it to his bipedal one, but he seldom does anymore, since there is no sea for him to swim in here. He has a human form of a size that is not difficult to fit through most spaces designed for people no taller than centaurs, but he is still quite tall, and in his truest form he is indeed a giant, but that is the full extent of the truth to those myths,” Loptr explained. “At least, in my case. I speak only for my own universe.”

He also handed a flagon to Clint, who thanked him profusely, and relinquished the scotch to Tony, who appeared relieved to have it returned to him, even with only about a third of it left.

“Loki have you found him?” the same Thor as before called, from slightly further away this time.

“No, go check the other side of the tavern, Thor; I’ll keep searching this side,” Farbautisson called back, smiling a little when it caused Anton to squeeze him a little tighter and nuzzle at his shoulder affectionately.

“I suspect you are lying to me Farbautisson!”

Anton swore under his breath.

“It really is your fault for training him so well, over the years,” Loki remarked.

Loptr sighed at the same time Anton did, “Yes.” Then they exchanged uneasy looks, apparently deeply alarmed by their similarities to one another.

“Oh darling, it looks like if you collect any other Lokis here tonight, you’re only collecting a lot of Thor’s brothers. That would be genuinely incestuous for you, wouldn’t it? I just realized,” Farbautisson mused.

Both Anton and Loptr grimaced at the very thought.

Loptr shook his head at them and strode away, to bestow drinks on others.

Clint looked like he might want to follow the tray, but didn’t because there was a god of chaos under it and he had rules about never following one of those again.

“Damn, you scared him away,” Anton whined.

“I’m not sharing you, get over it, you fool.”

“Brother!” Thor called, from much closer.

Tony pointed at the nearest staircase. “I hear there’s a library to hide in up there.”

Farbautisson clasped his shoulder and kissed his cheek. “Thank you, love.”

“Okay, I get your fucking point,” Anton seethed, and began pushing him towards the staircase, causing Loki to laugh at him all the way there.

Staring after them for a long moment, Tony tried to figure out whether he wanted to follow Loptr through the crowd or not. The man had seemed such a temptation when he first came in, and now he was a redhead as an added bonus, so why did Tony now feel hesitant to chase him, suddenly?

 _Because you’re terrified of commitment, asshole,_ his brain reminded him, in the voice of one James Rhodes, who had told him that very thing on at least three past occasions in Tony’s memory.

 _Right._ Then he realized that his hesitancy was because he was already emotionally compromised, and therefore was trying, on some last desperate subconscious level, not to get ensnared any further.

Resisting temptation was never one of his strong points. Until emotions happened. Then he could resist all sorts of things, for avoidance’s sake. Thus, he decided to get a room for the night, and try to sleep through the storm.

 

~~

 

The line for room rental was long. Having little patience for queues had been a major factor in Tony’s decision to pursue a life of piracy. It was a life which absolutely minimized his queue-exposure.

Well, actually that was just a pleasant side-effect of pursuing piracy as a career, but Tony was only just now realizing just how vital it might be for his own functioning. He was not designed for this patient, polite, not-chatting-with-anybody environment which required him to do nothing but wait. Patiently. Without much stimuli.

“I swear, Morrigan, I didn’t have any hand in landing us here,” the man behind him was insisting to the woman accompanying him. “I am, in fact, going to be livid if I miss Beltane for this. I haven’t had a guest for Beltane in far too long, you know-”

“Yes,” the woman said, and Tony recognized her voice, but her accent seemed very strange to his ear. “I do know. I know because you complained about it a great deal last year, and this year won’t stop bragging that you’ve snagged a prince for the decoration of your chambers.”

Turning around, Tony jerked in surprise at seeing not only Natasha wearing a cloak made of raven-feathers; but a version of himself wearing nothing but a traveling cloak, tall boots, and soft brown leather pants, as well as sporting a full set of antlers with thirteen pointed tines on them. “Wow, you don’t sound nearly as much like me as you look. What accent even is that?”

“Cern, what have you done?” Morrigan demanded. “What is this?”

“I’m nothing to do with that antique collider, thank you,” Tony said, “but that’s a weird nickname for somebody with antlers.”

“My full name is Cernnon, so it makes plenty of sense. What by the nine do you mean by ‘antique collider’?” Cern asked, a bit haughty.

“You’re not a god of mischief too, are you?” Tony asked hesitantly.

“No, I’m god of the forest and innovation. She’s goddess of magic, warfare and death. And you are?”

“Admiral Anthony Stark. I’m a pirate. In space.” He pointed up, then remembered he was in a strange interdimensional nexus and he wasn’t actually sure there was an outer-space here, in the same way as it would apply to a place that resided in a universe, rather than in-between a bunch of them. So he lowered his hand sharply. “I’m also human. Not exactly a normal one, but human.”

“Apparently, we’re in a place of multiversal crossings,” Morrigan said.

“You should also be able to get out as soon as the storm passes, as long as you know the way, which for the record I don’t,” Tony said.

“You seem strangely comfortable with that,” Cern mused.

“Well, I’ve got a ride waiting for me.” Tony then realized that he had referred to Loptr as his ride and managed, with an effort, not to redden at the thought. He may have had to mentally picture a brisk and icy winter scene around them to do it, going so far as to imagine seeing wispy clouds form with his every exhale, but it succeeded, and that was what was important.

By that time, he was at the front of the queue at last and finally someone called out to him that blessed word: “Next!”

Tony fled towards that voice with haste, before he could give in to the impulse to ask this version of himself if he had Loki as an enemy or a fetish, just to complete his collection of such answers for the night, and got himself a nice, private room.

 

~~

 

The storm was too loud to sleep through, but Tony tried his best regardless.

Further adding to the din, he could hear through the floorboards that most of the guests were all awake and chatty, trading stories and waiting out the storm. After only three hours of trying to avoid it, and avoid inevitably being asked to tell one of his own stories, Tony went back downstairs, found a table full of strangers, and sat down amongst them.

None of them were Tony. None of them were Avengers. None of them were gods.

None of them insisted that Tony tell a story of his own, and instead he let theirs wash over him like dreams, and wondered if this might not be a good substitute for dreaming, except that he did feel himself growing more tired, as the night went on.

He caught glimpses of Loptr and Charlene intermittently throughout the night, as they made their rounds attending to their guests. He once saw a familiar set of antlers stroll past their table, while a blond man in a trench coat told the story of the first sky-burial he had ever attended. But Tony was able, mostly, to forget himself awhile.

There was a fire in a nearby hearth. The stories of hospitable strangers filled his ears and heart and brain.

At some point, Tony might have fallen asleep at the table.

 

~~

 

Tony dreamed.

 

_“Holy shit, Rhodey, look at that ocean.”_

_“Yeah, man, but that’s all there is, here: ocean. There’s only one colony and we’re nowhere near it.”_

_“Exactly why we’re here. I found some islands for us. Nobody will look for us here. The colony wasn’t successful enough to get more funding for expansion. So they’re legally obliged to retain a stable population, limited to the thin temperate regions on the only continent-sized landmass on this planet, and they’re literally on the other side of the world.”_

_The relief that flashed through his best friend’s eyes made his chest feel funny. “You mean we could stop running? We could have a real base?”_

_“A home base. A place you can actually live on. You can even build another ridiculous garden, I made sure.”_

_Sun glittered off the endless seas as Rhodey pulled him into a hug so tight his ribs threatened to creak. “Tony…”_

 

~~

 

“Tony. Admiral?” Loptr shook the human’s shoulder again and then flinched back at the way the pirate suddenly jerked upright, hand up and a glowing circle at his wrist suddenly suspended over his palm and humming alarmingly as he aimed it straight ahead at… nothing.

Tony lowered the mini-repulsor and blinked around blearily until he spotted Loptr’s face and blinked again a couple more times for good measure. “ Hello, gorgeous. I remember you. ”

“I’m flattered. You’ve been asleep for a few hours. The storm is passed, now. I’m to take you home.”

The human looked up at him for a moment, thoughtful even through his hangover. “Why can’t you go home to your universe?”

“It no longer exists. Myself and my family are all that is left,” Loptr replied, and then rested his palm against the mortal’s forehead gently. His fingers, emitting a soft emerald glow, brushed the admiral’s hair back slightly in the process, and from the contact he was able to detect the astral umbilicus connecting Tony’s soul to his own native universe, out of all the others which connected to this place.

Tony was holding his stare, wondering if it was just the magic that made his face feel slightly tingly. Possibly it was a combination of magic and sympathy. “If I can find out how to travel here and back on my own, you should come visit mine.”

“We shall have to see, then, how you fare in that venture,” said the trickster.

Then the whole inn around them, and Loki, and in fact everything except Tony and the technology and clothes he brought with him, seemed to fade out of existence around him, leaving a temporary white-out.

Then all the light went away.

And there was a terrifying sensation of falling.

Tony landed with a dull thud on his back, finding himself in the cabin of his flagship, right where he had been aiming to land before the reality-storm blew him right off-course. His watch emitted a series of alarmed beeps and quickly adjusted to local network time.

Upon seeing it, the admiral grinned.

It was only ten minutes since he had left. He reached under his vest, pulling a key piece of very important machinery from an inner pocket. It was small, and highly specialized, and it was the whole reason he had to risk his life trying to make a last-minute jump home despite the odds.

And its presence in his pocket, and the barrage of missed messages accrued on his wristband’s display just within that ten minute span of his absence, assured him that Obadiah’s flagship had met its final and grisly end at last, after he’d left it, and he was free again.

The last element who could have betrayed the location of the people Tony valued most in his universe, and who had tried to end the admiral’s life twice, was dead as a doornail and no one could trace it back to his legal shell operation Starkfleet Industries or to any of his piratical agents. The data he would be able to extract from the communication-server he yanked out of Obie’s flagship computer would allow him to track down every last one of Stane’s collaborators within his fleet, and SHIELD’s, too, making those bastards owe him a nice shiny favor.

Victory was sweet, indeed.

Once he struggled back to his feet, he noticed he had also missed a call from Rhodey. Before he could try to call back, Rhodey called him again.

Amused, Tony answered. “Hey, buddy.”

“What the hell happened, Stark? You went totally missing off everybody’s radar! No teleport should have taken that long!”

“Well… I’m not sure how exactly a piece of reality-storm hit me, but it did. Funny story, though. I went to the same inn at the end of the world that Natasha did, last year.”

“You mean that wasn’t an elaborate hallucination of hers?”

“No, honeybear, it was legit.”

“Damn. Meet anybody interesting?”

Tony groaned a bit. “Well… yeah. It’s a long damn story, and I kind of need to discuss it with Tasha, first. She met a couple of the same folks, and I want her opinions on some things.”

“Wow, you sound conflicted, suddenly, what’s happened there, Tony?”

“A lot, actually. I’m exhausted, to be honest.” He rested a hand on his nearby oak desk––which didn’t budge, because it was heavy, and bolted to the floor––and leaned on it heavily, really feeling that exhaustion set in even despite his head still whirling turbulently from that last conversation with Loptr-Loki.

“You going to miss the victory party then?”

Tony cackled. “Not on your fucking life, Commodore.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the most part, Jörmungandr is a gentle giant, especially compared to his much more chronically ungentle family members. Sure, he turns into a giant sea-serpent, and damn does he look intimidating, but people who have actual conversations with him think of him as The Nice One. Never harmless, of course, but… Nice. Less likely to terrify people just by smiling at them. It causes people to underestimate his manipulative capabilities, and as a son of Loki, he knows perfectly well when to use that to his advantage.

After the victory party, Tony was hungover for a full day, hurting from it worse than he had since he was a teenager. He manfully crawled forth from the safety of his bedroom when JARVIS refused to threaten anyone into making and delivering brunch to him. Luckily for his pride and the kitchenware, given his current state, Natasha found him halfway there, and gave him a cup of coffee.

The admiral drank it, and when his attention finally drifted from the heavenly brew and the pleasant sensation in his face as his pulse quickened just a little from the caffeine, and his mug was empty, he found himself sitting across from Natasha in the breakfast nook, with its view overlooking the increasingly greenery-bedecked lavender-grey stony outcroppings between their home base and the eastern half of an enormous bay with crystal-clear waters, and an array of tall and jaggedly rocky islets beyond its mouth––beyond the edge of the energy shields that both supported and concealed their base’s biosphere. Beyond the reach of that sphere, all traces of green were replaced by a sun-bleached deadness: bare stones unable to support much more than lichen and the occasional swarms of insect-like creatures which seemed to emerge from caves in the islands around dusk, and swarm any of the local sea life unfortunate enough to be stranded by the night-time tidal shifts, which in turn were caused by the complex interplay of the effects of this planet’s three largest moons.

There was a whole archipelago of such islands, of various sizes, each with deep roots anchored to the sea floor, which loomed beyond the mouth of the bay, leaving only a narrow clear passage far west, for any safe traffic to escape towards the sea on the water’s surface or below.

Of course, all those islands shielded this large and unusually deep bay––and all of the relatively new unnatural human-habitation-compatible installations concealed under said bay––from rough sea conditions and from some other less native threats.

Tony tried to focus on them as he began sipping down a second cup of coffee Natasha handed to him, savoring it a bit more than the first. She also placed a plate in front of him with two muffins on them.

“Steve made them earlier, they’re not still warm, but-” She stopped, seeing him inhale the first one.

After a sip of coffee to prevent himself choking on the muffin he ate far too quickly, the admiral shot her a suspicious look as he woke up enough to muster suspicion over why she was being so helpful without any prompting, and why she seemed to be watching him, and waiting for something. “What are you angling for?” he sighed.

“So you went to the World’s End Inn?”

Again, he sighed. He had a feeling he’d be doing more of it throughout this conversation. He considered adding whiskey to his coffee, but decided against. “Yeah, I did.”

“You notably didn’t talk much about it, beyond telling people that previous descriptions of the place from Clint and I remained true. Clint thinks you embarrassed yourself and don’t want to talk about it.”

Tony had no doubt the pair had a wager over that, and didn’t confirm or deny the accusation. He’d felt embarrassment and chagrin throughout his stay at the inn, but he wouldn’t exactly call those moments the defining ones of his visit. He just drained his coffee mug, unblinking, and waited for her to elaborate a little more.

After several seconds, she tilted her head to one side. “What did you really think of the place?”

“Well, now you mention it… I do suspect that there were a lot of details you didn’t tell me about your trip there, and I’d like you to fess up to some of them now,” he responded, smiling sweetly, though his tone was bitter.

She batted her eyelashes at him. “Such as?”

“Was there only one of Loki there?”

A grin tugged at her lips. “Only one.”

“Is this all somehow related to why Clint is so insufferable when the topic of what he did there gets questioned, to this day?”

“Loki out-pranked him. He hates being reminded of it, because it really was elaborate and I’ve been sworn to secrecy against saying more than that.”

Tony sighed. “Well, if he thinks the same thing happened to me, feel fee to tell him it didn’t. Was there a version of me there too?”

“Yep.”

The admiral considered. “Was it the one who tried to kiss him, or the one who tried to kill him?”

“Tried to kill him, actually, but he confessed it was over the circumstances of the death of their daughter, after he had apologized upon realising that he had attacked the wrong Loki. He refused to explain more than that where I could hear it, but he did spend awhile talking quietly with Loki, when he managed to take a break between shifts.” She looked thoughtfully at her friend. “Then I asked Charlene if this was commonplace, and she told me a whole boatload of stories about different versions of you.”

“I’m… still stuck on the daughter thing.” His brain was, in fact, trying hard not to do something embarrassing like ask himself what his hypothetical offspring with a god of lies might look like. “I didn’t actually see any female versions of him?”

“Well, from what Charlene told me––in some universes Loki hangs out in female form more often than others, whether born to it or otherwise, and given that so many universes seem to bring the pair of you together it’s only statistically likely, at some point, there-”

“I get it. And I would like to move on, please.”

“You might make a pretty good dad, actually.”

Tony blanched. “You’ve gotta be joking.”

“You’re doing pretty well by the Avengers, the Guardians of the Galaxy, and various other renegades under your protective banner these days. You even have a secret colony with a prosperous farming community full of annoyingly nice people,” she chided him. “You’re practically domestic, by pirate standards.”

He bristled. “I am not!”

She only laughed at him. “So you met other versions of you?”

“So many! It was ridiculous! Absurd! Surreal, even! And most of them were probably fucking their own tall, handsome bastard with cheekbones that could cut glass and legs for days, and I––couldn’t tell whether to be freaked out or jealous of them,” Tony sighed. “Well, except the one who had been to the inn before and clearly looked at me and presumed I would be an enemy before I even opened my mouth, and who ran away after another universe’s version of Clint tried to put an arrow through his eye.”

“Really?”

Tony nodded his head. “The one you met before went by Loptr to avoid confusion, this time around. Other Lokis kept showing up, so it was necessary. He went ginger for similar reasons, shortly after they started arriving.”

“So aside from falling into bed with _Loptr_ , then, what happened?”

He frowned at her. “I didn’t. Fall into bed with him.”

She looked genuinely shocked. “But he’s your type.”

He cleared his throat.

“And even more so when he went ginger, or did that throw you off? Did he have freckles too much like Pepper’s or-”

“I hadn’t thought about that actually, but way to ruin the redheaded-Loki fantasy material I had going, thanks,” Tony responded in dry, pained tones. “Now it’s all corrupted with conflicted emotions.”

“Seriously, though, Tony, you’ve failed me,” she told him. “I owe Clint $50, over this.”

“Sorry to disappoint, but it got emotionally complicated practically right after we met. A pair of us who were apparently enemies with a secret relationship the Avengers didn’t know about went from break-up to make-up at the table right next to where I landed. Loptr offhandedly told them he had already met versions of them who were married, and acted like he already more than halfway knew me––it was unnerving.”

“Do you know how infrequently I lose bets? Think of how frequently Halley’s comet passes by Earth.”

“Look, I know, and I’m swearing you to secrecy over this whole embarrassing mess, but I mean… ” He gestured broadly. “That whole night got so surreal it felt like a fever-dream. I honestly stopped trusting that any of it was real, okay?” He leaned back in his seat with an air of weariness.

Natasha nodded, still looking displeased, but also resigned, and a little concerned. “Okay. That’s different, then.”

He shot her a questioning look.

“Feeling unreal is a major turn-off for most people I know,” she responded. “When the world around you feels unreal, the mind tends towards depersonalization and detachment––neither of which are particularly erotic sensations for most humans. No wonder you didn’t actually fall into bed with him.”

“Ah,” Tony said. “I… you’re right.”

“Well, that and your fathoms-deep wells of trust issues.”

Inclining his head in her direction slightly, he conceded, “Agreed. I almost forgot all about even them once I got to finally pick Loptr’s brain about the compatibility of magic theory with actual physics, but I guess he didn’t, because after he got called back to work by Charlene, he kept himself distant from me the whole rest of the night, and always seemed to be either out of reach, or only briefly stopping by.”

Natasha’s brow furrowed, and she frowned slightly, displeased at this oversight in her own reading of the trickster in question. “That’s odd. He seemed nothing if not painfully direct, with us.”

Tony thought about it. “He was more careful about maintaining an arm’s-length distance from me than from other versions of me, actually, even before that.” He frowned more deeply, at that thought. As he tried to figure it out, he asked, “Oh, and you did double-check that Asgard really doesn’t exist in our universe, right? I’m guessing no, but just in case...” He raised eyebrows at her expectantly.

“I’ve never found it, not in any records hacked from anywhere: not S.H.I.E.L.D., not the Nova Corps. There’s such a thing in some old myths on Earth, but they seemed a little more crude than the version of Thor I met at the inn, which makes me feel so bad for him that Hydra co-opted some of those myths and symbols into their own aesthetic, along with swastikas,” Natasha confirmed.

“That really is a pity,” muttered the admiral.

She nodded. “Our ‘myth’ version has Loki as Odin’s blood-brother, not his son. He also murders one of Odin’s sons with mistletoe, winds up chained to a boulder under the earth with his own son’s entrails while a serpent drips venom into his eyes as an eternal punishment, that sort of thing. It’s all very mythological. Thor’s stories were… pretty different. None of them involved Loki giving birth to a horse like our Earthly myths do, for instance.”

Tony grimaced slightly. “A horse?”

“In the story, he turned into a mare in order to make sure Asgard won a bet against their contractor so they wouldn’t have to pay him to build a wall for them.”

“The mare…”

“Was to distract the stallion workhorse their giant contractor was using to move his supplies around, building the wall too fast, when the bet hinged on him not being able to complete it in time, for the Aesir’s sake.”

“Polytheistic religions have the weirdest stories.”

“We also don’t have a Yggdrasil––no cluster of nine worlds interlinked to one another and dependent on one another mystically,” Natasha said. “At least, that’s what Dr. Strange said when he got back from a visit to a different inn in as similar reality storm. He met Loki’s daughter, rather than Loki, anyway, so it had to be a different inn.”

“Those storms keep getting more frequent, lately.”

“They happen a lot, apparently, but they usually don’t hit the same universe so many times in such rapid succession as we’ve been experiencing. I guess something made us special?”

Tony frowned at that. “Like what? A lack of Asgard?”

“Well, what are the perks of having one anyway?”

The admiral had no answer for that, but then said, “Well, there is whatever makes gods live so long. You said yourself Loptr admitted to being older than christianity in his own universe. He looked pretty fine for somebody over two thousand years old.”

At that, Natasha frowned, looking shrewdly thoughtful suddenly. “Yeah… I suppose lacking that could be a problem.”

“What’s that look for? What did you just work out?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit, Red, don’t give me that.”

“Well… if you worked at the World’s End and saw yourself happily involved with somebody who never existed in your universe, over and over, and then finally meet an unattached version, but he’s got a life-span of decades compared to your centuries-long lifespan,” Natasha said slowly, “it might make sense to keep a minimum safe distance, wouldn’t it? Maybe it wasn’t just you who decided against pursuit, that night––maybe he was in the same boat as you, but with the addition of knowing he’d have to watch you die in what would feel to him like a pretty short period of time, if he fell for you like other versions of him clearly have.”

Tony’s chest did something weird in response to that. Fluttery and sad. He disapproved strongly and told it to stop that, and never do that again.

“I feel distinctly like you keep implying there’s some sort of hookup conspiracy for different versions of me and him throughout the multiverse. And like he’s bought into this conspiracy.”

“Conspiracy? No, but based on what data he has probably collected so far, just from Charlene?” She held up her left hand, palm-up as she explained, “There have been genuine examples of you two being nothing more than enemies who really hate each other. Charlene specifically hates those versions, and complained about them at length; however-” Natasha held up the palm of her left hand next to it, slightly higher. “-she pointedly mentioned that there were only five of those she was certain were never lovers too. You’re more often romantically involved than not, and I had a feeling you wouldn’t want to be an enemy to ‘Loptr’ if you ever met him, after I’d conversed with him. Hence the bet with Clint, and not telling you all about this pattern before now.”

He snorted. “You knew I’d be more tempted to try to overtly buck fate?”

“Also that it would trigger your emotional commitment issues.”

Tony nodded, his thoughts drifting back to the reasons why he didn’t pursue Loptr through the crowd with seduction in mind. “Did you hear about, uh, Jörmungandr?”

“No. Who is that?”

“One of his sons.”

“What about him?”

“Well… the way Loptr said it, it sounds like ever since he and his family set up their lives there, he’s had to sort of shrink himself to fit. He’s a giant, or something, and usually likes to spend time as a snake, ignoring people in favor of swimming in the ocean for long periods of… his whole life. Until working at an inn became his new normal, because there’s not a safe ocean in that place for swimming in, where the inns are.”

Natasha looked out the window of the Avengers citadel tower they resided in, over the vast vividly blue ocean of a scarcely-colonized world in unfashionable end of the western spiral-arm of their native galaxy. “Ah… your heart-strings got yanked on by that, didn’t it? He didn’t phrase it anything like that, I’m guessing.”

Tony made a chagrinned face, brow furrowed in concern. “You know me. I read between the lines. He corrected somebody who asked if his kid was a giant snake by saying that his son often prefers to be in that form, and idly pointed out that he doesn’t do it anymore since they left home. I inferred the rest, but come on.”

“And you just happen to own some amazing beach-front property.”

“You sound like you’re judging me.”

“Oh,” she assured him dryly, “I am.”

“C’mon, Red. Imagine with me all of the potential perks of a giant guardian sea-serpent in our already impressive moat?” he gestured towards the window, and its broad ocean-view. The sea was lovely and shiny, and didn’t in the least betray the presence of so many armed systems of Tony’s design lurking protectively along the sea-floor, under its gleaming surface. “We’d have our own Nessie.”

Natasha snorted. “Okay, while I will admit that sounds pretty badass-”

“Doesn’t it?”

“-you’re still a ridiculous creature, Admiral.”

“Look, I’m allowed to have trust issues regarding an interdimensional hookup with somebody I still honestly know very little about, who might have killed a lot of people.”

Natasha looked thoughtful. “You don’t know for certain he’s killed anyone.”

He shot her a look. “He probably has. He walks utterly silently, and carries himself like he’s proud of being poisonous to touch––much like you. You telling me you didn’t get a ‘this guy knows hundreds of ways to damage a body’ vibe off him?”

She sighed. “Well––yes, but he’s a prince from a warrior society, from what I can tell. They’re trained for war. That doesn’t mean he’s a murderer.”

“Charlene seemed to think Loki has a penchant for poisoning people,” Tony said.

“Some versions of him.”

“Most versions, and apparently the reason different versions of Clint want Loki dead is because they were mind-controlled by him” the admiral corrected. When he saw her expression turn appropriately cold and vicious, he smiled in an equally icy manner and added, “Obie tried to have me poisoned after I was kidnapped instead of killed, you may remember.”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “But you still want to invite his son over for a swim? A literal giant sea-monster?”

“Yeah, how likely is a sea-monster to poison me? I mean, be reasonable; I am pretty sure he does not need to resort to that. He could probably just eat me. ”

Natasha opened her mouth to argue that, then closed it.

“You know I’m right.”

“And _conveniently_ you might just land yourself back in the tavern with Loki in any future quest to invite his son to guard our ‘moat’.” She tilted her head. “If you don’t succeed at that, you decide to, what, find out more about him from his son?”

Tony frowned. “That’d be awkward for him, and pretty rude of me. No, that’d just piss them both off.”

Natasha’s eyebrows raised very high indeed. “Good. So I should do the interrogation, you’re saying.”

His frown deepened. “Not for my sake.”

“You really want to impress them,” she crooned, beaming gleefully when this made him grimace. “It is adorable how hard you are trying to stay mean and suspicious about this, while still failing to be ruthless if it might offend this guy or his son.”

Rubbing his hands over his face, the admiral made an exasperated noise from behind them, but didn’t actually dispute the accusation.

“So. How hard is the transport going to be, to take you back to the tavern?”

Tony groaned. “Magic is a bitch, okay? Just maddening. This could take ages.”

“Then you have work to do if you want to tap that ass you missed your chance to tap before.”

“You just want an excuse to go double or nothing with Clint for my next trip there, don’t you?” Tony sighed.

Natasha beamed at him. “Whatever gave you that idea?”

“Uh huh. Just for that, I should bring him here before I get into his pants.”

She frowned at him. “Oh, come on.”

“Tell you what, when the time comes, I’ll flip a coin.”

“No you won’t.”

“No, I won’t. If he pushes me against a wall before I can remember to sabotage you, though, you still might have hope.”

She frowned, but nodded. “I can live with those odds.” Her stare then turned steely and shrewd. “Now… tell me about these other versions of you, too.”

“Aw, c’mon.”

“That’s the price of my keeping quiet about this: you must _tell me_ all about anything I ask, now.”

His eyes narrowed, at that, but after careful consideration, he nodded. “Fine… there was one of you, as well. Possibly more, but I just ran into the one.”

Her eyebrows raised. “Oh?”

“She was a goddess of war and death. Definitely you, though.”

Natasha looked resigned at that, but it came with a wry smile. “Were you a god in her universe?”

“I guess so.”

She shot him a disbelieving look for several seconds, until she accepted that he would require a verbal cue this time. “Were you with me? I mean, not me––the goddess one.”

“She went by Morrigan. The… god with her was Cernonn. And he was me, apparently. Even the beard, which is possibly the weirdest part. I feel like I should change the angles up again maybe?” He gestured at his immaculately trimmed facial hair. “Just a little more emphasis on the jawline, again?”

“What was he god of?”

“He was god of sex, pure and simple,” Tony replied, in airy tones.

“Liar.”

“Innovation and, er, forests.” He shrugged.

“So I had a feather-cloak and you had…”

“No shirt on, I was a bit less man-scaped, and had a set of antlers.”

Natasha blinked and gestured to indicate a head covering. “Like, on a helmet, or-”

“No, no. Growing right out of his head. No headband, no make-up effects. The thought of hair-management with a full set of antlers is daunting, but I was glad to see that strange pagan version of me manage the feat. I might even grown out my hair again, and paint a few blue whorls on each temple, down the back of my neck, and across my shoulders; I must admit he had quite a _Look_ going, even by my standards.”

“Did he still have a glowing chest?”

“Yeah, though it looked sort of dappled-”

“So if he could fly, he could save christmas, you’re saying?”

Tony sighed. “Do you want to know about any of the others or not? I really didn’t speak with our more supernatural selves for very long, beyond getting their names, before somebody else dragged me into another conversation.”

She humored him and nodded magnanimously. “Carry on.”

So he listed them off, and summarized each version of himself of Loki he could recall, answering her prodding questions for each one: the breakup-to-makeup couple, Lyesmith, Farbautisson and Anton. He told her what Morrigan and Cern had actually said, while in the queue.

“Wow, so even your antlered version hooked up with Loki?”

“‘A prince’ doesn’t have to mean Loki.”

“Well, I doubt it was Thor.”

Tony frowned at that thought. “Could be T’Challa?”

She snorted, shaking her head. “I’ll concede it’s possible, but not super likely.”

“Are you saying he doesn’t love me?” the admiral put a hand over his heart, looking crestfallen.

She chuckled at him. “Any others?”

“Not that I met, but the other Clint I spoke to mentioned there was another of me high on an alien spore of some kind, refusing to take off his rollerskates. I’m honestly sorry I missed him.”

Natasha giggled more brightly at that. “Me too.”

 

~~

 

Next, Tony leapt right into experimenting on how to replicate the bizarre array of conditions that flung him violently to the floor of the tavern at the World’s End Inn when he had tried to teleport away from Obie’s flagship while it began to self-destruct as an unpleasant side-effect of Obadiah’s heart stopping, which in turn had happened after Tony had stabbed him a few very decisive times.

This may have resulted in a full week of time locked away in his lab, reluctantly making video-call appearances for vital meetings, during which he tended to continue tinkering with new ways to warp time and space.

He should’ve known this would lead Pepper to hunt him down when he extended this behavior into an eighth day, but he was still a bit surprised when she did finally appear. “Hey, Pep, how’s tricks?”

“You’re supposed to get out occasionally, if you’re a pirate. Aren’t you tired of shore-leave yet?” she insisted. “You have a lab on your flagship.”

“Not with the same facilities. My ship would be a time-bomb if I kept some of the machinery I have here on her at all times, and tried to actually use them on a mobile spaceship. Oh no, this is the safer research zone for this project, Pep.”

“Well, you’ll have to leave off of it. You have off-world business to attend to. Taskmaster is back to terrorizing the trade portal to Andromeda we opened last month.”

Tony sighed. “I really hate that guy.”

“We all do, Tony,” she assured him. “We all do. Now go beat him up, please.”

“Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”

 

~~

 

When it wasn’t Taskmaster, it was S.H.I.E.L.D. discovering they had been infiltrated by Hydra for years. When it wasn’t Hydra, it was Skrulls trying to invade the ranks of Tony’s fleet, and once they got rid of the Skrulls, opportunistic Kree started to show up to scavenge intel and make the Avengers still more miserable.

All in all, Tony hadn’t found much time to work on a new unit for his teleportation array which would allow him to reach the nexus between universes where the four inns of myriad apocalypses resided, without accidentally punching a hole straight through into another universe.

It was the latter part which was surprisingly tricky.

Which was how he accidentally landed in a Helheim far, far away.

Not that he knew that was where he landed. He just knew that there was a vast cathedral-like cavern around him, and an altar, and a tall woman with a bicolor theme (green-eyed with skin covered in blue-black whorls on her left side, ink-black eye and pale skin on her right) casually bickering with a wolf.

“Um… Hello,” he said, waving slightly.

“You have reached the Land of the dead,” said the horse-sized wolf, who had two  green eyes. It was a familiar-looking shade of green, on both of them. “I don’t think you meant to.”

“Yeah… I’m pretty alive. Sorry to intrude, let me just-” He tapped out what should have been the reversal-code into his wristband, but got an error. “Shit. Uhm. Can I get a lift back to my universe? I was trying to land more sort of between places, rather than specifically into a whole other universe, and I’m terribly new at this sort of travel.”

“You’re Anthony Stark, are you not?” asked the woman, looking amused.

“Admiral Anthony Stark, at your service,” he said, bowing courteously instead of snapping out the correction this time. He had noticed that this woman seemed terribly gracious and power rolled off of her in waves. Also she might be his only hope of leaving.

She smiled at him. “I am the Queen of Helheim, and this is my brother Fenrir. We know of you in this universe. You’re developing a reputation.”

“Only perpetually.” Tony supposed he should congratulate himself on having arrived somewhere surprisingly relevant. “Nice to finally meet you, too.”

She chuckled softly, then raised one hand, glowing with a smoky dark purple light, which suddenly seemed to fill the admiral’s awareness just before Helheim vanished and he found himself back in his lab, blinking at nothing.

“Huh,” he said, and went back to adjusting his calculations.

 

~~

 

His next experiment was a far greater success, but still sort of a failure.

He landed on the floor of an inn again, which was promising. The sky outside the nearby window looked just as bruised and unnatural as before, which was promising. There was even a very tall stranger with incredible cheekbones, but it was clearly not any version of Loki. His eyes were bright yellow, and his hair was a silvery-bluish hue, but not due to age if his very smooth unlined features were anything to go by.

Two out of three promising signs, Tony decided, was not bad.

He tried to say as much, but what escaped him was a groan.

“Mr. Stark?” asked the tall man.

“Admiral,” he croaked.

“Have you been to one of these inns before?”

Tony blinked blearily up at him. “Yeah, I don’t suppose Loki’s around?”

“Not at this inn, no, Admiral. I am Jörmungandr.”

The admiral’s eyes widened a little and he sat up on one elbow, thankfully without being electrified–– _no hail damage this time, good_. “Nice to meet you. I have to test something real quick.” He tapped the reversal command into his wrist band interface again, and this time the same technicolor whirlwind took him up and he landed… in his own lab, ungracefully, but by no means a crash landing. “Fucking success!” he cried, and hit the forward button again.

He then materialized once more in front of a slightly perplexed Jörmungandr and landed mostly-upright this time, with a dull thump.

“It works! Sort of. Hey, you like oceans, right?”

The jotunn blinked at him a few times. “I… do?”

“Right, your dad mentioned. If you can tag along on my next jump back, my home base is an isolated island chain in the middle of a vast sea. The only other colonists are legal ones, but not very well funded, so they aren’t spreading out much anymore, and they’re on the other side of the world.” He grinned brightly. “Want to come over for a swim?”

Jörmungandr looked hesitant, and wary. “You’re no enemy of my father’s?”

“If he told you about my title, he probably mentioned: we don’t have an Asgard. As far as Doc Strange could tell, we don’t even have the structure of Yggdrasil for earth to hang in. I don’t have any reason to be your enemy, and it sounded to me like you’ve been sort of cooped up awhile, am I right?”

He nodded.

Tony pulled himself up to his feet, tapped a few commands at his wrist again, and then proffered a hand. “Let’s go for a swim.”

Jörmungandr took his hand, initiating the sequence. Sending them to Tony’s homeworld away from homeworld.

 

~~

 

A few hours later, drying his hair with one towel and sitting on another on the beach, Tony looked up at the sounds of approaching footsteps and smiled at his friends. “Hey, guys. Want to swim?”

Rhodey and Natasha both politely declined.

They were staring at a serpent almost a quarter-mile long, playfully churning up the waters in ways resulting in tall, highly-surfable waves towards the shore. Every now and then a playful roar sounded from the creature.

“The waves make for great body-surfing, though,” Tony promised. “I’ve been at it awhile, it’s mostly safe.”

“Sure,” Natasha said, droll and clearly unconvinced.

“You were really serious about bringing him here for a swim,” Rhodey said faintly. “Dude, you know snakes scare me.”

“Think of him as more like a dragon with no legs,” the admiral suggested. “Besides, look how damn happy he is.”

“No denying that,” Natasha mused. “Whether he will ever want to leave, is another question.”

“He plans to go back,” Tony said, with gentle surety. “Not that I may not invite him to come over anytime. I was serious about how cool it would be to have a dragon in our moat on this world, here. This sure doesn’t look like a fun place to invade with the world’s politest sea monster playing terror of the high seas like a playful puppy.”

Rhodey shot him a look. “What kind of puppies do _you_ know?”

The admiral laughed. “Seriously, though, he’s still just enjoying the freedom of movement, you can tell. He’s playing, snookums, that’s all.” He reached over and patted his friend’s knee reassuringly.

“This is admittedly the greatest length you’ve ever gone to make a good impression on somebody you want to sleep with, that I’ve ever seen,” said the commodore.

Tony twisted the towel in his hands and attempted to snap it threateningly in Rhodey’s direction, but the other man side-stepped the snap, cackling at him all the while.

 

~~

 

After his initial prolonged frolicking, Jörmungandr had vanished into the depths, apparently intent upon exploration. By the time he emerged several hours later (once more in his more compact bipedal form) and rejoined Tony in his tower, he found the admiral surrounded by his Avengers, as they set out plates around a large table. The serpent recognized them all from having met different versions of them at the inn over the years. Steve Rogers was laying out silverware while scolding Clint for tossing plates into their places, arguing that no matter how good his aim was, he was bound to chip one of the plates eventually. Dr. Banner strode in, followed by James Rhodes, Sam Wilson, and Natasha, each carrying a platter with a different food on it. The main course seemed to be a massive pot of curry, the aroma of which made Jörmungandr’s mouth water, even despite the massive amounts of fish he had consumed already.

Tony spotted him in the doorway and called him in, making rapid-fire introductions. The dining room felt too small, as most rooms did to the serpent, but there was a welcoming quality to the closeness, here: these casually-intergalactic-law-breaking people had invited him to join their dinner. There were little signs all around that these mad heroes lived and thrived here in a sort of chaotic-neutral peace. They behaved like siblings, like family towards one another. The admiral insisted on loading up his plate.

Eventually, Jörmungandr began speaking to Rhodes about his garden, and about some of the fruit trees that the Jotunn missed from his own universe.

“It must be rough, having lost all of them.”

“All but a few seeds, yes.”

At that, Rhodes brightened. “You know, Tony said you’re welcome here anytime, right? The gardens included, not just the sea.”

Jörmungandr tilted his head.

“You want me to see if I can grow any of those seeds here?”

“One of the toughest things for me to adjust to when I switched to the pirate lifestyle was not having a place to grow a few plants, to remind me of my mother’s gardens,” the commodore explained. “If you want a place like that, I can help you keep it, and tend a few plants you’ve been missing.”

The serpent might be quieter and gentler than most of his siblings. Some mistook this for a lack of guile, and Jörmungandr took some advantage of that, so he did not smirk as his kin might have done, when he looked for a long thoughtful moment at Admiral Stark––who did not notice the look, busy as he was being mocked by Bruce and Natasha at the time––and then back at this commodore. He kept his smile soft and almost disbelieving. “I would love that, Commodore Rhodes. I do miss our apple trees so much, in particular.”

“Really?”

“Yes, they’re golden and taste like the sunrise.” He visibly fumbled through a pocket dimension up his sleeve––he did not keep his so organized as his father’s, so it took him a moment––and pulled out a small leather pouch. From it he withdrew three seeds. “One of these, at least, should grow. Shelter it well, until it is quite strong, before you bury its roots in your garden.”

Rhodes beamed at him. “I certainly will.”

 

~~

 

After returning Jörmungandr to his inn, Tony had been riding high on that personal victory for a few hours before his whole good mood came crashing down.

Specifically, the Guardians of the Galaxy returned to home base looking the worse for wear, and declared that Thanos had gotten his hands on an Infinity Stone.

“Well, fuck,” said the Admiral. “There goes the rest of my vacation days for the year, I just know it.”

And he was right. Well, actually, he wasn’t. Because it took two years to completely eradicate the Thanos threat, and that of an unexpected cancerous other universe trying to push into and infect their own once the mad titan was made vulnerable to it.

Overall, it was a real mess. Even once the wars were over, the resulting reactions of galactic governments had kept Tony and his best spies like Barton and Romanov busy for longer than the others, usually sabotaging weapons shipments and turning diplomacy into hostility between empires trying to bring back old forms of charitable imperialism, as they called it.

Until finally, finally Tony could go home. He declined to rendezvous with the others, deciding to teleport straight home.

He instead hit a goddamned storm. And it hit him on the head at some point.

 

~~

 

Tony woke up to the familiar sensation of wooden floorboards under his back, and the familiar sounds and smells of beer and smoke around him. He blinked up blearily at a familiar-ish face. “Jörmie?”

“I’m afraid not,” said an amused rumbling voice. “You landed hard, and seem to be slightly concussed. I can heal that with a bit of magic, if you like.”

“That’d be wond'rf’l.”

The stranger reached down and touched his forehead, cool healing magic sinking through his skull and making the mortal sigh in bone-deep relief as his muddled thoughts cleared a little.

“Thanks very much,” Tony groaned, with sincere gratitude. Then he managed to get his tired eyes to focus and realized he was looking at someone with a face very much like Jörmungandr’s, but shorter in stature, with wildly wiry brown-black hair and eyes as green as Loki’s. His clothing was mostly leather, not many armor accents, but his collar and cuffs did seem to be edged in fur that looked… somehow very much like his hair. The stranger grinned widely, showing teeth that did not look human: canines long, teeth too pointy to be called premolars despite being located where humans would normally have premolars.

“Ah,” Tony said. “You must be Fenrir?”

“Yes. You look as though you’ve been put through quite a lot, Admiral Stark.”

“Yeah, well. Just finished cleaning up after Thanos,” he groaned. “And only about a fortnight before that was actually killing him. It really, really took way too long to kill that bastard.”

The stranger appeared surprised, his unnerving grin fading.

“You did kill him, though?”

“Only once it was safe to,” Tony said. “There were nasty complications.”

“I congratulate you, then. Ours died at precisely the wrong time.”

Tony winced. “Don’t tell me it was the cancer-verse?”

“It was,” the wolf murmured. “No one could stop it in time. So my father fled, with us in tow, to a safe place at the end of all worlds.” He proffered a hand, and helped the admiral back to his feet. “Thanks, by the way, for hosting Jörmungandr. He speaks very well of you, and your crew, most especially Commodore Rhodes, and he seems happier, having a place to swim again.”

A thought occurred to Tony. “How do you usually visit each other? Do you all teleport?”

“We’re all capable of it, but I myself usually prefer to walk, in wolf-shape.”

After determinedly not making any of the eight jokes about the wolf going out for walkies that ran through his head, the admiral proceeded to mentally kick himself for not thinking of that sooner. “It’s… it’s seriously possible to just _walk_ from one tavern to another?”

Fenrir nodded. “Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?”

The pirate wasn’t even sure how to begin to answer that. He had basically just discovered he had been overcomplicating half of his data regarding the magic-based rules of entry for this place, and sure as hell didn’t want to admit it. “Y’know, I have no real idea. I’m a bit curious why your brother never mentioned it; he knows I’ve been trying to travel to the other inns.”

“Interesting, yes.” Fenrir looked deeply amused, suddenly. “The walk can be dangerous for a human alone, during these storms. Of course, I could give you a lift.”

“Isn’t teleporting also tricky in this weather? That’s how I wound up here on both accidental occasions.”

Chuckling softly, the wolf began to lead him out the door, “That isn’t the variety of lift I meant. To which relative am I delivering you?”

Tony opened his mouth to reply, but it hung open for a few seconds in surprised silence as Fenrir chose that time to shape-shift. The action was alarmingly sudden: one moment, there was a man-shaped creature with wolf-teeth and his father’s eyes, and the next moment where those eyes had been was a broad expanse of fur. Having seen the towering wolf-shape once before helped, but somehow Fenrir seemed even larger this time; although perhaps it was how little distance there was between him and the wolf’s head, which was larger than a horse’s, causing ancient parts of the admiral’s very human brain to light up in alarm. He shook his head to clear it. “The one I haven’t seen in the longest time.”

Fenrir snorted. “Fine, but I’m not sticking around, then. Versions of you and my father are at your most embarrassing when you’re new to each other, in my experience.”

“How many of me have you met before?”

“Six.” Fenrir then stretched out his forelegs, lowering his upper body. “Now hop on and hold tightly.”

Tony’s eyes widened, but when the wolf shot him an impatient look, he snapped into motion, climbing onto Fenrir’s shoulders and gripping the scruff at the base of the wolf’s neck hard. “I’ve never felt more like an extra in the Lord of the Rings in my life.”

Fenrir only laughed, and began running at a lazy, loping pace down a path into the nearest woods, while not-quite-thunder crackled and flickered through the bruised colors of the nebulous sky.

 

~~

 

Once deposited on the porch of the first World's End inn he’d visited, Tony waved at the retreating form of Fenrir and steeled himself a bit before pushing the door open. The wall of noise that greeted him, from all the others trapped in this particular storm, and the light from the hearth, made up for the cold air and drizzle that had plagued the whole walk here and Tony sighed into the warmth as he shut the door again behind him, and shrugged out of his long outer-coat, shaking some of the excess water off of it as he scanned the crowd for any familiar faces.

His coat was mostly a faded red––one that had clearly once been both darker and more vivid when the coat was younger––with sandy gold accents at the collar, cuffs, its belt and belt-loops. Under it, he wore a fine long-sleeved red tunic that stopped a few inches past his pants inseam in length, and a belt about his waist of a leather that matched the shoulder-holsters––one cradling a gun he habitually kept set to stun, and the other a small, very vital tool kit for theft and sabotage purposes. Only his black jeans were Earth fashion, though his sturdy boots wouldn’t exactly be considered very odd there, either.

Tony spotted Charlene first, but she appeared not have spotted him yet, so he made the effort to melt into the crowd around him and sidle out of her line of sight. She would find him eventually, but for his own impulsive reasons the admiral wanted to find the god of mischief himself, first, if he could.

He drifted back towards to bar, but only saw the woman Loki had identified as the landlady (however that worked) behind it, and so drifted out amongst the various tables in the tavern.

He certainly wasn’t expecting a total stranger with elf-ears and a colorless bicolor theme on his face that Tony thought was painted at first (it just looked much less organic and natural than his only other point of reference for a similar appearance––namely Hel) to attempt to disembowel him, out of the blue.

The outraged cry of “You rotten bastard, Anton!” was all the warning he got, but it was enough, because he spun around and shot a blast from the mini-repulsor mechanism up his left sleeve, and it hit his attacker in the face, knocking his aim off just enough for the admiral to dodge the sword aimed at his belly.

Then, unexpectedly, the floor opened up under the mad dark-elf’s feet and he fell through it with an enraged scream, and the force with which the floor magically slammed itself shut again made it seem to shake under Tony’s feet enough to completely unbalance him and send him tumbling to the floor.

“Ow,” he said. “What the fuck?”

“I did mention, last time you were here, Admiral, that the walls of this place possess their own powerful magics, and are rather good at peace-keeping when provoked,” said a familiar voice, low and amused, and just as gorgeous as the pirate remembered. “Good job dodging Malekith’s poisoned blades, however.”

Looking up at the god of chaos, he gave a sigh of mock-exasperation. “Damn, even when I walk in through the front door, you still only appear once I’m flat on my ass.”

“The storm delivered you outside the door this time?” Loki asked.

“No, I walked. Well… I hitched a lift, but now I know I can walk here anytime I want, even if the only tavern I can actually land in is Jörm’s, for some reason. I’d love your input on figuring that quirk out, though. I’ve been working on it for ages, but after the last leap in progress was what got me to a his tavern, then Thanos tried to take Gamora back from us, and understandably my life was all a total mess for over a year.”

Loki shot him a sympathetic look. “Did you kill him?

“Yeah. After we made sure the cancer-verse wouldn’t benefit from it. Fenrir mentioned that’s what got your universe.”

The god shot him a piercing look, at that. “It was.”

“I mean, when there were lulls in the chaos I still tried a couple of new prototypes, and finally got the landing a bit smoother, but I always seemed to land in the same place when I got here; I assumed it was something magic-related, after a certain point, and continued to overcomplicate my theories accordingly.” He looked slightly abashed admitted it, but figured he probably wouldn’t be able to hide than from Loki for long, and thus coming clean about it sooner would probably lessen the duration of any potential mocking laughter from the too-pretty and too-clever mage.

“You kept trying?”

“Yeah, further foiled by Rhodey borrowing my equipment to bring your son to our place for day-trips and gardening; they even got Bruce involved with Jörm’s trees. I ran into Fenrir and Hel once, too, but not in any of the inns until today and that was just Fenrir; before that, I accidentally punched through to another universe, but uh, they knew me anyway.” He made a face. “It’s been a really difficult couple of years. Except Jörm, he’s been great.”

“He has enjoyed his ‘day-trips’ immensely. I thank you again for… for giving him that freedom back, as I could not,” Loki said slowly.

“It’s really no problem. We like having him around––especially Rhodey. He keeps wanting gardening tips, fuck if I know why.”

Loki’s brow furrowed at first, then realization seemed to dawn and he glanced away quickly. “Perhaps I underestimated how much he missed the lands as well as the sea.”

Tony noticed, though, that the tips of the god’s ears were slightly pink as he said it, and wondered what he was missing. “Yeah, well, I don’t know what he’s done, but somehow the pair of them have doubled the size of our orchards, and some of those trees have matured a few years faster than I think they could’ve without mystic assistance. I appreciate it, of course.” Now he felt the back of his own neck warm up and suspected it was visibly pink as well. _Damn, where did all my suavity go?_ As if to further his point, he blurted out, “Would you like to see it?”

Loki smirked to himself, small and sly, for a moment before he met Tony’s gaze again, and that smirk widened, showing his teeth. His eyes roved appreciatively up and down the pirate’s body. “I do think I would like to see more of you, Anthony.”

“There is one other nagging question I have for you, though.”

“Oh?”

“I’m really not sure why Jörm didn’t tell me earlier I could walk over here anytime. He knew I was trying to get back here. Was he just being protective of you, y’think?”

The trickster shrugged, and just the tips of his ears were pink again. “Well, my kin are very protective of one anoth-” Loki was briefly distracted by the Landlady tossing a bottle of scotch in his direction after recognizing his guest. The god offered him the bottle, just as Charlene had when they first met.

Tony shook his head and smiled when the trickster vanished the bottle apparently up his sleeve. “What do you prefer to drink, anyway?”

“Since working in this place, I’ve discovered some fortified brandies from worlds I’ve yet to visit which are both potent and divine,” the god suggested.

“Well, I’m very interested in your taste.”

“And I yours, Admiral.”

Stepping closer to the god, Tony tilted his chin up challengingly, baring his throat and letting his teeth visibly drag across his lower lip. “Then sample me.”

“I would like rather more than that, from the likes of you.” Loki took gentle hold of his chin, and kissed him rather ungently.

Tony’s head swam, his body tingled and one of his hands cupped the trickster’s face without first requesting permission from his brain. His thumb finally traced the curve of one of those incredible cheekbones as Loki’s silver tongue robbed him of all higher thought capacity. The god of mischief tasted like spiced apple cider and glaciers, and he smelled of cloves and pine trees. Tony was addicted instantly, and when Loki broke the kiss and pulled back to meet his gaze, the admiral may have whimpered.

“You hardly know what you are getting into, with me,” the god warned.

“You neither, but I know exactly what I want getting into me,” Tony shot back, and bit Loki’s lower lip to emphasize his point, enjoying the sound of the trickster’s shaky intake of breath in response.

Charlene cleared her throat loudly behind them, startling them into halting the kiss.

Loki turned his head just enough to meet her stare with one eye, while Tony peered at her by leaning over a bit to see past the tall god’s shoulder.

“You’re still on duty,” she warned the god.

“Even if I plan to steal him from the inn?” inquired the admiral. He then managed not to squeak when Loki squeezed one of his buttocks appreciatively to reward those words, but it was a near thing.

Charlene’s eyebrows raised. “You’re serious?”

“I’m a pirate,” he reminded her, “therefore: stealing treasure is one of my many prerogatives––especially the kind I want all over me.”

“I’m seriously considering letting him, for a while,” said the god. “If I enjoy being stolen sufficiently, I may come back for my children if they’re willing; although Hel and Fenrir actually seem to enjoy running their inns more than they enjoyed running the land of the dead, in our previous universe, so they will most likely stay regardless.”

Rubbing both hands over her face, Charlene emitted a heavy sigh. “Fine, fine. I should’ve known you’d abandon us. Gods are all alike.”

Loki grinned, able to hear her struggling not to laugh. “Do try not to miss me too long, darling. Your heart will recover someday.”

She did laugh then, and elbowed him as she bustled past them, apparently leaving the pair to sort themselves out.

Tony took the opportunity to mouth at Loki’s neck and felt the god’s grip on him tighten, both hands now kneading both sides of his ass greedily as Loki began to breathe faster close to his ear, the lobe of which Loki soon bit and suckled.

They were shocked out of their momentary lapse by a door-key being flung at them very hard. Loki scarcely managed to maintain enough awareness of his surroundings to catch it before it hit Tony in the eye. They both turned to look in the direction from whence it came and saw Charlene again.

She was now gesturing towards the nearest stairwell. “Get a fucking room; I’m not cleaning up after your first time. Get out of here, c’mon, shoo.”

Tony reflected that the sexiness of the situation did suffer, slightly, from being herded up the stairs like naughty children by Loki’s coworker.

This suffering was alleviated immediately by the god of mischief pinning him against the nearest wall as soon as they reached the top of the stairs, and capturing his mouth again. That wicked silver tongue swirled and conquered and claimed all it touched, leaving Tony writhing and struggling to keep up with where the god’s roaming hands were. Were there only two hands? More? Fuck, why was _that_ hot?

After persuading the human’s legs to wrap around his waist, Loki pulled him off of the wall and carried him without effort to the door which matched their key. How they actually got the key back out of the keyhole, the door open, and themselves through the door, was a bit more of a blur, but Tony soon found himself pinned to the inside of the door, and Loki persuading him with firm touches to get his feet under him again––only for his knees to wobble out of sheer anticipation as soon as the god knelt between his legs and all of their clothing vanished after a few flickers of green light, similar to the ones which also lit the candelabra in the far corner, and the oil lamp on the nightstand.

“Now that’s practical magic I can get behind,” Tony panted.

“Perhaps after I have _your_ behind,” Loki teased warmly, then swallowed his lover’s cock to the base before the admiral could even open his mouth to reply.

Forming coherent words, in fact, moved itself to very bottom of Tony’s priority list, all of a sudden. Loki’s mouth was hot and passionate and _talented_ and that tongue kept swirling and teasing along his cock even as the trickster’s throat squeezed tight around him in a slow, deliberate swallow that Loki followed with a rumbling hum that Tony could feel in his very bones.

“Oh _fuck_ , Loki,” Tony moaned, his hips taking on a mind of their own, desperately seeking more of that incredible mouth, but Loki’s hands pressed him back against the wall with seemingly no effort, thanks to inhuman strength, and the trickster began to bob his head up and down slowly, tongue tracing intricate and maddening patterns up and down his length. When a long, slick finger pressed into him and quickly found his prostate, the admiral scrambled at the door frame with both hands, then gave up and gripped the god’s shoulders hard as he struggled not to come yet.

Then Loki moaned loud and low, swallowed hard around him again, and he lost that struggle with a small scream anyway. He almost screamed again when Loki increased suction, possibly to a degree stronger than a human could achieve. The mortal emitted a choked-off sound when warm, tingling waves of magic visibly sparked up from Loki’s hands into his skin, washing away fatigue and bringing back full arousal, but not doing much to decrease the sensitivity of the head of his cock.

When the trickster finally found just mercy enough to pull that devilish mouth off of him slowly, with a pop as suction was finally released, Tony sagged a little, only to start writhing again as another finger slipped into him and Loki began to mouth at his balls. “G-good _god_ , Loki-”

“You never struck me as a man of faith, Admiral.”

The noise that escaped him then might’ve been a whimper, and he was rewarded for it by a third finger and a cruel twist of Loki’s wrist which put such pressure on his prostate that he almost yelped, instead smothering the sound into a sort of groan.

“Yeah, well, you’re the first god I ever met. I think that means you get dibs,” Tony managed to reply, groaning when this inspired the trickster to stand up again, and bite hard at the side of his neck while fucking him faster with those too-clever fingers. His own hands seized the chance to wander over all that lovely and godly flesh once more within reach, roaming and groping at will across smooth skin and old scars. He could feel the strength of Loki’s whipcord muscles underneath: hard as marble, but responsive as quicksilver.

“I wanted to take you apart that first night––see what all the fuss over the great Tony Stark by any other name or title, was really all about,” Loki then purred into his ear, each syllable delivered smooth as velvet; although every now and then he let a consonant escape that was nought but gravel––rough and heavy. “But you seemed inclined to shop around amongst our other selves.”

 _Oh was that it?_ The jealous implications of the words may have made the admiral shiver not-unpleasantly as much as that incredible voice. “Can you blame me?” Tony panted.

“Mmm, perhaps.” The trickster used one arm about his abdomen to drag him up the wall until Tony could anchor himself there with both legs wrapped around the god. Soon after, the hard surface of the door at Tony’s back was replaced by the bed, the room a swirl of flickering firelight and wooden walls around them for a brief moment.

Once there, the admiral further pleaded his case, only whining a little as the new angle let the god of mischief more easily speed up his assault on his lover’s prostate: “You already h-half knew me, and thahhhh–– _fuck_ ––that’s a dangerous game.”

“Oh, terribly, and you crave _that_ too.”

At that, and Loki’s addition of a fourth finger, the mortal couldn’t find the will to argue against the obviously true statement, or to do anything other than emit a wanton moan and try to rock his hips up for more. As with most attempts to rob him of words, however, he still found them again eventually. “Well––oh _fuck_ ––yeah, why d’you think I kept trying to come back here for you?”

The fire-bright grin, full of sharp white teeth, which that earned him, was one of mixed disbelief, affection, and something suspiciously like joy. “For much the same reasons I’ve hoped you would succeed, one day, I presume.” Those teeth then dragged across the mortal’s lower lip affectionately, pulling it into their grasp briefly, before Loki’s tongue swept over the top, on its way back into Tony’s mouth.

The admiral could feel the curve of the trickster’s lips into another smile when the withdrawal of those talented fingers resulted in a whining groan of complaint. Tony savored the feel of it until the feel of the god’s cock pushing into his ass made him gasp harshly, breaking the kiss even as he struggled and writhed in an effort to speed up Loki’s maddeningly slow advance. “My _god_ , holy fuck.”

“I like the sound of both prospects.”

Tony curled his right arm tight and high about Loki’s waist, pushed against the nearest bed-post with the other, and shifted his left knee further up, in order to achieve the leverage necessary to push himself up and closer to the god abruptly, taking almost all the rest of him and causing a mellifluous moan to be shocked out of Loki, who helplessly jerked his hips in response, which successfully closed the remaining gaps between them, leaving Tony emitting a victorious cry and grinning up at the slightly-stunned god. “Then get fucking, sweetheart. Make me feel it.”

Eyes glittering with challenge, only a sliver of green still visible around pupils blown wide, Loki responded, “Oh you sweet scoundrel,” and began attempting, as far as the pirate could discern, to see whether the bed-frame or Tony’s pelvis would give out first, with each pounding thrust of his hips.

The admiral howled, and writhed, and scratched red lines down Loki’s back as he lost the ability to do more than react and cling to the heavy god over him, whose mouth now hissed wicked promises in his ear, “ _However many ways you love to be taken, I will find them out, and I will have you until your own name escapes you. How many times can I use magic to make you come for me in one night, do you think? How many before you beg me to never stop?_ ” The smell of their mingled sweat and the bone-shaking force of Loki fucking him, and the way his own cock between them ached for friction, all conspired to drive Tony far from rational thought altogether.

“L-loki, please,” Tony moaned, not even able to finish the thought before he came up with a solution, and his hands buried themselves in Loki’s hair to drag the god’s mouth back to his own forcefully, changing the angle of the god’s thrusts so that Tony’s cock now rubbed against his stomach with each successive one. Tony whimpered increasingly loud as the molten heat pooling low in his stomach abruptly overflowed and orgasm crashed through him. He broke from the kiss with a low scream and shuddered as Loki kept fucking him, not even slowing, and not letting him come down from the high until several full-body spasms wracked through him and he almost sobbed with over-sensitivity.

When he saw a flicker of green and felt Loki’s magic creep along his skin again, bringing him back to full hardness, Tony trembled only further, still sensitive, but now whimpering once he finally felt the god come inside him and relax that grip on his hips, while moaning his name. After a few long moments of the both of them being still and breathing fast, the mortal noticed the god got no less hard. “No magic needed for you, eh?”

“There are perks to being a god, and you are very inspiring. How long do you think you can keep up, Anthony?”

“I can take anything you dish out, sweetheart.” Tony wiggled his hips for emphasis, able to feel some bruising on them when Loki’s fingers, still resting on them, stroked over the skin. The thought of having Loki’s finger-prints on him for days sent a crackle of satisfaction through him. “Now sit up, I want to ride you. Then fuck you over the side of the bed, maybe.”

“I think I like you demanding,” Loki purred.

“Good, because I usually am.” He smirked as the god tugged him up into another kiss while also obliging his demand.

 

~~

 

Admittedly, by the time the storm stopped, Tony really was reaching the limits of his own physical endurance, even with magic assistance. He lost track of how many times he came sometime after Loki had summoned a duplicate of himself, which they only kept around for a few rounds. Towards the end the mortal had almost passed out while Loki was riding him, and avoided having to admit anything resembling defeat by virtue of Charlene knocking on their door and shouting at it to remind them it was check-out time for guests washed in by the storm now––which somewhat embarrassingly occurred mere seconds after Loki had just come with a loud cry, and taken Tony right with him over the edge while the pirate kept repeating Loki’s name.

“Glad you both had fun,” Charlene added cheerfully, before audibly strolling down the hall, with heels merrily clicking.

The trickster rolled his eyes, making Tony giggle, then groan once Loki pulled off of him to stand beside the bed. He felt a flicker of something like magic again, this time apparently removing traces of lube and come from his skin, dried and otherwise. “Very convenient spell. Got anything to help a pitiful mortal with sore muscles before I have to attempt to walk out of here?”

Loki chuckled softly at him. “You held up quite well, I thought,” he said, running green-glowing fingers up Tony’s body from his calves to his shoulders, healing magic creeping under the skin in the wake of his touch, to heal the muscles––but to leave behind all those surface marks he had put such effort into covering the mortal with.

Tony hissed relief at the cool, soothing sensation––softer and more syrupy in movement through him, somehow, than the other spells. “Yeah, okay, that was worth admitting weakness for––damn, that’s good.” He smiled further when this earned him a brief kiss, not-quite-chaste, in response.

“I believe you planned to steal me.”

“Well, where’d you vanish my coat to? It’s got my teleportation tech in it, but I didn’t exactly have time to repair any damage it might’ve gotten from the storm.”

“So you’re going to make me steal myself, then?” Loki teased, but summoned their clothing onto the bed. He could have redressed them both, but didn’t feel inclined to cover the mortal up just yet; he just wanted to reassure him that his belongings were not gone, nor meddled with.

Tony grinned at him, sitting up and resting his feet on the floor beside the bed, though they barely reached, due to the height of the bed. “I was thinking classic seduction. I’m still stealing you. Persuasively speaking.”

“I suppose I can let you get away with that, for now.”

“For now?”

“I may decide to tease you about it later anyway.”

Resting a hand over his heart, the admiral mock-gasped. “Oh, the betrayal.”

Loki laughed, at that.

“If we’re going via your magic, though, it’d be faster if you could actually put the clothes back on us, maybe?” He was at first stunned, then deeply pleased when he realized the expression the god leveled at him in reply was, in fact, a pout. “The sooner we get clothed and go back to my place, the sooner you can undress me all over again. Well… after the team finishes swarming me, which they will. I was on my way home from some of the last diplomatic work we had to interfere with amongst people trying to fill Thanos’ power vacuum, once we did kill him, when I landed here again.”

The god’s pout intensified into a small frown, but there was also amusement crinkling at the corner of his eyes even so, and it soon led to one corner of his mouth quirking up as he ruffled the pirate’s hair. “We do need to return the room key, as well.”

“Again, easier with clothes.”

With a sigh and a look of regret, as well as magic and an unenthusiastic hand-wave, Loki redressed them in their respective clothing, and drew Tony away from the bed, and out the door.

 

~~

 

Tony hadn’t actually expected to witness Loki scolded for several minutes for abandoning his job on such short notice, by the landlady in one of her most colorful saris––mostly orange and red, with intricate abstract designs in white and pink around the edges of the cloth. He did expect Charlene and a couple of the other members of staff to leer at them both the whole time they were trying to return the key, which the landlady didn’t take from Loki’s hand until her venting was done, and after taking it, she reassured him that he could return to his job there anytime, and shooed them away to help customers now in line behind them.

As they left, Loki admitted, “It’s been years and I still have no idea if that women likes me, or not and she just likes that I am a fairly reliable employee except around some versions of Thor.”

“What happens then?”

“Mischief, generally. Pranks, spilled drinks, awkward personal details shared with people they want to flirt with just to piss them off,” Loki listed. “Only one explosion occurred on such an occasion though, and I maintain that was not actually my fault.”

Tony sniggered. “I heard you pranked my Clint when he was here with Natasha.”

The trickster clicked his tongue, looking deeply amused. “I had forgotten about that. He isn’t still sore about it, is he?”

“What did you actually do?”

“He attempted to put a ‘kick me’ sign on my back, and so I caused the sign to become indestructible, fall off, flutter back across the room and glue itself to his back instead.”

“He still whines about it, but he’ll get over it unless you keep bringing it up.”

Loki sighed. “I suppose I shall only… very occasionally remind him.”

Tony shook his head. “Whenever you’re ready, then.” The trickster then took his hand, and just as before, the whole world around him vanished––except this time, Loki didn’t vanish with it.

That made his heart beat louder in his ears, and gave him a better rush than even his most successful previous heists. Oh yes, no mistake: this was stealing a treasure that had been hidden away at the World’s End for too long.

 

~~

 

Tony landed right where his teleporter had been aimed before the storm caught him: home. Specifically, his own quarters, where he had originally hoped to have time for a shower and a drink before the others returned to base after most of them converged at the rendezvous point, all boarded the ship Steve had taken out there, and came home.

“Good to see you back, sir,” JARVIS greeted him.

Loki glanced ceiling-ward which seemed to be the general direction the voice was coming from, eyebrows slightly raised.

“Loki, meet JARVIS, he’s the computerized intelligent system that runs the house and most of the functional parts of my lifestyle. He’s reachable throughout the house and complexes throughout the islands, so if you have any questions or need directions around the place, you can call on him.”

“Impressive,” the trickster murmured. “I’m charmed to meet you, JARVIS.”

“JARVIS, this is Loki Lie-smith, god of mischief, and Jörm’s dad. He’ll be staying with us awhile.”

“It’s good to meet you as well, Mr. Lie-smith,” the AI said.

“How long was I off the map, J?”

“Just over a full hour, this time. The others have been made aware that you’ve arrived safely, and will be here within an hour. Commodore Rhodes and Dr. Banner remain within the house, and in the bay barracks fleets VI and IX are both on leave presently.”

“Oh good. VI did okay with the Kree? They weren’t at full strength when they got hit out there,” Tony asked.

“Yes, sir. Also, Rhodes and Banner are currently in the elevator headed to your quarters, now that they are aware of your safety.”

Leading Loki reluctantly away from his bed and out into the penthouse living room and blinked a bit at the daylight from the floor-to-ceiling windows that took up one whole wall, with a large balcony beyond it. Tony’s penthouse overlooked a considerably broader view of the bay’s clear-looking waters, though the bottom of the bay lay too deep to be seen clearly except very near the shore––most of the rest of it lay too far down to be reached by they sunlight. Some of the cliffs within the human-habitable protective spheres supported by some visible buildings and some cloaked ones that Tony couldn’t help noticing Loki seemed to spend awhile looking in the direction of, despite that cloaking tech. He wondered how different the world really looked to somebody with magic as powerful as this trickster’s.

“Join us for drinks?” Tony offered.

The trickster nodded. “Of course.” He then sat at the bar off to one side of an extremely long couch, both of which formed the living rooms most distinctive features, while the pirate strolled behind the bar and pulled out three glasses. For himself and Loki he poured some Metaxa over ice, and added a small splash of pomegranate juice. When the elevator dinged and opened, he served Loki his glass and called to his friends, “What’ll it be, boys?”

The pair stopped and stared for a moment at the unexpected guest, but recovered fairly fast, inured as they were to Tony Stark being full of surprises.

“You went to the inn again, then,” Rhodes sighed. “Why were you gone for so long this time? Last time it was what, ten minutes JARVIS couldn’t find you?”

“The duration of a visit is rarely consistent,” Loki said. “It is a place of accidents, and while it does not usually intend to keep people away from their natural lives in their own worlds for long––although if some people want to stay of their own accord, they can often find a way to do so––the actual time anyone is missing from their native universe after accidentally visiting one of the inns, varies quite a bit, but is usually no longer than two hours at most.”

“That sounds interesting,” Dr. Banner replied.

“You two never answered my question,” Tony reminded them. “Drinks?”

“I’ll have some of that juice you’ve got out,” Bruce said, pointing at the pomegranate juice.

“Just a beer please,” said the commodore to his friend, and then towards the trickster he directed the question: “Are you this Loki guy that Tony’s been pining after?”

“Dammit, Rhodey,” the admiral sighed. “I was not pining.”

“You were a bit obsessed,” Bruce pointed out.

“Et tu, Brucé?”

“I am Loki,” the god confirmed for them. “It is a pleasure to finally meet you. My son speaks well of you both.”

Rhodes beamed, and Bruce offered a shy smile.

“He seemed to expect you here soon,” said the commodore. “He insisted pretty strongly, just last week, that we weren't supposed to pick anything off his trees until you picked the first fruit.”

Loki looked confused for just a moment, then his ears went pink again, even brighter than before, just for a moment before changing back. Only Tony had been close enough to tell that the change didn’t look quite natural and he muttered, “That a glamour?” just quietly enough his voice wouldn’t carry to the others.

The god cleared his throat quietly, but otherwise ignored the question, responding instead to the other pirates. “Are these fruits apples?”

“Yeah, and they look pretty amazing,” Rhodes confirmed. “Jörmungandr’s magic was able to rapidly mature most of our plants from Earth, but it still took him two years to get the apples from your universe to finally develop fruit, even with his, er, boosting.”

Tony noticed how Loki’s free hand resting on the edge of the bar gripped tight for a moment, luckily not enough to damage it, and very deliberately slowly Loki set his glass down on the bar as he kept smiling at them. _Yep, totally a glamour._ “Interesting, maybe that’s why he didn’t tell me I could’ve just walked from his tavern to yours instead of fighting my tech the whole time.”

“I would further guess that his magic might have been part of your difficulties, and how unerringly you would always land in his inn, after the first time you did,” Loki mused, enjoying how suddenly confused Tony’s friends looked, as they sat down on the other barstools and Tony handed them their drinks.

The admiral, by contrast, chuckled. “Damn, really?”

“Why keep you away before the apples were ready, though?” Rhodes asked.

Loki looked down at the floor for a few moments, then back up to meet the admiral’s gaze as he explained slowly, “Because they are Idunn’s apples: the source of the longevity, strength and fortitude of all the Aesir in Asgard, before its fall, and myself. Eating a few every century allowed us to maintain life-spans of between five and ten thousand years––presuming we don’t get ourselves killed by other means. Mortals given the apples, thus, would reap very similar benefits.”

Tony’s whole mouth went dry and he couldn’t look away from the curious, thoughtful and wary look in the trickster’s green eyes. “Oh.”

“So has your aging sped up, since you left your universe?” Bruce asked.

“No. The inns at the ends of the worlds are peculiar places. Those who live and work in them full-time, as it were, do not age. Without the apples, however, my aging might speed up within the next century, cutting my remaining span in half,” said the god. “It seems my son was under the impression that once here, I would be inclined to stay for quite some time.”

“Well, I was hoping,” Tony murmured.

“Of course, two apple trees, even young ones, will have fruit in excess of what Jörmungandr and I might need, and knowing him, he may well have planned to make sure all of you he’s decided that he likes enough will wind up eating one soon. Presuming he didn't already.” He smiled at the stunned looks Rhodes and Banner shot him. “He is the best of my children at feigning guilelessness, due to his significantly quieter ego compared to the rest of his kin––myself included––and his tricks are thus often the very subtlest, and often the best-intentioned, but he is still very much my son, and being sly and a bit underhanded comes to all of my children quite naturally.” He fairly beamed with pride as he said it.

“I think I’m starting to understand, yeah,” Rhodes mused, while thinking to himself in a tone of resignation, _Romanoff was right, he really is your type, Tony._

“So he basically gave the Avengers mythical apples of youth,” Bruce muttered.

“Not a lot of downsides, so far. Any weird catches?” Tony asked.

Loki shrugged. “Well. You’ve basically got magical apples that could give any average human god-like strength and stamina in your garden, so it’s a very good thing these islands are so well fortified against attack. I recommend not telling every single member of your fleets about their existence, if only because it would render this planet very unsafe, very fast, for knowledge of these to be widespread, especially while their output is so low.”

“It is a bit like Erskine’s serum without the nasty side-effects, by the sound of it, and we’ve all seen how dangerous just being exposed to it and its knock-offs has made life for various Avengers,” Bruce said.

“Erskine?” Loki inquired.

“How many Steve Rogers versions have you met?” Tony asked.

“Only three,” said the god.

“Yeah, most of his super-human qualities, aside from the force of his personality, were from an experimental serum a long time ago that a lot of people on Earth have been trying to recreate the results of ever since. Natasha was given a knock-off of the serum developed in Russia. Bruce was trying to see if gamma radiation was involved and a lab incident occurred after which he gained the ability to turn into a giant green rage monster at will,” the admiral explained succinctly. “Notably his powers include: increased strength and reflexes, an infuriating tendency to not visibly age, the ability to be frozen in a glacier for decades and then thaw out and feel dandy after, that kind of thing. So, close to what Aesir were like, I guess.”

“I can help to hide their existence, of course,” Loki pointed out. “We have not even begun to discuss the ways in which my magic might further enhance your defenses here.”

Tony felt the back of his neck heat and his dick twitch at the thought of combining Loki’s magic into aspects of his tech, learning more and more about how it works as they did so. “That sounds awesome.”

“I would have to start with a tour of the place, of course, or a map,” said Loki.

“Looking to join the crew, then?” Rhodes asked the god, while smiling a little at how excited and ridiculously infatuated his best friend’s expression looked.

“I believe so,” Loki agreed, his voice warm.

Rhodes and Banner exchanged glances, and drained their drinks in unison. “You better get started then, before the others get back and swarm you with even more questions,” Rhodey told them. “We can try to start setting up a few minor ways to delay them, but they’re a persistent and nosy bunch.”

“Thank you both, then, and best of luck in that endeavor, ” Loki said, as the doctor and the commodore stood up and headed back towards the elevator. Before they even reached it, Tony had walked around the bar and kissed the god firmly.

Once the elevator dinged and its doors were shut, the admiral broke the kiss and said, “Wasn’t just me pining, was it?”

“No,” Loki panted. “Now I’ve had a taste of you, I would like to continue tasting you for quite some time––even if the effects of a golden apple will cause the marks I leave on your skin to heal away faster, that is a small sacrifice to make for more time with you.”

The admiral kissed up the side of his neck. “Mmm, I’ll miss that too.”

“However, you would require far less magic to maintain your stamina, if you will allow me to pick an apple for you.”

Tony went still at that, though is body fairly hummed with excitement, at that. “You saying I’ll be even more of a sex god, like you? Damn, we need to go to the garden––immediately.” He dragged Loki off the barstool, grinning at the delighted laughter from the god as he let himself be led out of the buildings and along a path to the orchard, where he could pick an apple for his lover.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> World-building notes:
> 
> The bay that the space-pirate Avengers reside on in this fic is based on a super-sizing of Hạ Long Bay on an alien planet with a lot more storm-based erosion making a lot of its cliffs a bit more pointy due to wear and tear. The islands are notably not primarily volcanism-made like a lot of Earth's chains of islands in the midst of wide swaths of ocean, but actually the result of a large sunken continent that is the only proof this world was ever cold enough to have massive lake-carving glaciers anywhere (notably, one carved out the massive trench-like bay the Avengers live beside) if only very long long ago, but due to later tectonic shifts this continent became a shallow sea, with only its highest areas still sticking up out of the sea for a few hundred million years; the Avengers' patch of islands (formerly used to be that sunken continent's biggest chain of mountains, but the tallest points wore down to hills over all those millennia) are comparable in size and arable-land and island-distances-apart to the Philippines on Earth if you were to subtract the added bulk of… well the whole south bit––all of Mindanao, really. They're just a bit south of halfway between the equator and the pole in the southern half of their hemisphere; the largest continent, with its one colony, are located quite a bit further north on the other side of the planet––and takes up considerably more space, of course.
> 
> The planet has puny ice-caps and the like, at its poles, in part due to its crazy seasonal current changes due to multiple powerful moons which is part of why there's a shielded biosphere to support human and plant life, and beyond the sphere's edges the native wildlife is fairly primitive and the flora is mostly lichens. Like Earth, this planet is at a jaunty angle in its elliptical orbit and thus has actual seasons, but not quite like Earth's. It's also among the reasons that the only galactic-government-supported colony is smack dab in the middle of a large continent, away from the volatile seas, except for half a dozen fishing-village-style port outposts (more difficult to maintain due to how far they are from the rest of the colony resources) which are only seasonally inhabitable. Whereas Tony just looked at their biosphere operations, and his own advanced shield and energy-generating tech, and figured he could make the island life work here––and he was right. His tech prevents the storms from tearing the place up, and the hostility of the seas all around them. 
> 
> Since the colony on the other side of the globe did discover species of Earthly sea flora and fauna that could thrive in the seas on this world, there have been many species introduced, mostly in order to support the human colony's food supply at a lower cost––hence the fishing ports, each of which are safe to travel to and from at different times of year: two throughout summer, two in winter, and two more that are only re-opened if early winter harvests prove direly smaller than anticipated for a given year, and only in very deepest winter. Only the northern half of the continent actually gets cold in winter, but this allows for some sea-life that normally dwells only in deep waters for temperature-preference reasons, to come closer to the surface, move closer to shore, and breed. Before the introduction of Earth species (some modified before being released, if their genetic drives were linked directly to Earth-specific seasonal shifts for their breeding seasons, etc) the seas were not only hostile, but mostly dead, supporting only worm-like forms and crab-like invertebrates around hydrothermal vents (not too unlike the weird vent life forms on Earth, but without any genetic input from Earthly stock) in volcanically active ocean regions, despite having a slightly lower average salt content than on Earth.
> 
> Enough vent-life evolved to crawl up onto islands to keep their eggs and offspring away from vent-dwelling predators that some island-dwelling scavengers developed long before humans discovered the planet, to exploit that food supply. Some are swarming insectile/bat-like things. Sturdy yet small, to usually create a small surviving and impossible-to-completely-destroy populations wherever storm winds might drag them to. Thus, they're the weird things that inhabit the cliffs outside the Avengers' biosphere. They adapted easily to eating fish and other non-native sea-life and a smarter continental version evolved shortly before human colonisation are something of a pestilence to the fishing villages on the continent, at times. No corals have been able to be introduced to the seas, due to the waters being mostly a bit too warm except at the very poles and even then only when it is one pole's turn to be in the Winter position.
> 
> If only Magrathea were still hiring, right?

**Author's Note:**

> A Child of the Snows  
> by G.K. CHESTERTON
> 
> There is heard a hymn when the panes are dim,  
> And never before or again,  
> When the nights are strong with a darkness long,  
> And the dark is alive with rain.
> 
> Never we know but in sleet and in snow,  
> The place where the great fires are,  
> That the midst of the earth is a raging mirth  
> And the heart of the earth a star.
> 
> And at night we win to the ancient inn  
> Where the child in the frost is furled,  
> We follow the feet where all souls meet  
> At the inn at the end of the world.
> 
> The gods lie dead where the leaves lie red,  
> For the flame of the sun is flown,  
> The gods lie cold where the leaves lie gold,  
> And a Child comes forth alone.


End file.
